


spidey squad

by peterstank



Series: built from scraps [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-30
Updated: 2020-01-26
Packaged: 2021-02-27 08:55:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 34,778
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22024435
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peterstank/pseuds/peterstank
Summary: “We stop bad guys, that’s it. There’s no need to get philosophical about a job like this, okay? It’ll only drive you crazy.”His head hangs. Nat gently pries the bottle of scotch out of his grip and sets it aside.“This job… it gets to you. It gets to me. Always has, no matter what side I was on. Somehow you always end up feeling more like a weapon than a human being.”He raises his head. “I don’t want to hurt people.”“Neither do I, but sometimes it’s necessary. Sometimes you have to hurt the people who plan on hurting others.”or: five missions that take place over the course of the missing year in built from scraps.
Relationships: Michelle Jones/Peter Parker, Peter Parker & Natasha Romanoff, Peter Parker & Pepper Potts, Peter Parker & Tony Stark
Series: built from scraps [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1556035
Comments: 307
Kudos: 648





	1. MISSION: LONDON

**Author's Note:**

> hiii!! so i promised y’all i would, and here it is! the first chapter of my spidey squad spin off!!

“Hello, you’ve reached the voicemail box of Peter Parker, please leave a message after the beep.”

“Funny—”

“ _Beeeeeep_.”

Peter hears Nat snort through the phone that’s pressed between his shoulder and ear. He quickly finishes packing away his books for lecture number four. After this he has two back to back labs and between it all he’s been trying to find time to study and work on the additional curriculum he and Harley have both implemented into their schedules. 

It’s a lot of work but at least it’s _easy_. 

“I need your help.”

Peter frowns. “Didn’t you just need my help like last month?”

“I don’t remember it that way.”

“Cute. Listen, I don’t mean to burst your bubble here, but I have like three important tests coming up that I cannot miss, not to mention all the lectures I’m taking where attendance is mandatory—”

“You have A’s in all your classes,” Nat replies swiftly. “And this won’t take that long. Just tell your professors you have a family emergency and need to go home for a few days.”

“You say that like it’s simple.”

“It is.”

“Have you ever _met_ a college professor?”

“ _Petya_.”

He groans while he walks. “You’re killing me, you know that?”

“I’ll do your homework for a month.”

“Yeah, because my grades going down would be a huge favour.”

“That’s rude. Maybe I’ll have to kidnap you instead.”

Peter rolls his eyes while he fishes his keys out of his pocket. Then he squints. “If I walk into my dorm right now, are you gonna be in it?”

She opens the door. 

“Hey.”

Peter hangs up. So does she. He glares at her for a minute. “You didn’t kill Harley did you?”

“No, but I think he came pretty close to giving himself a panic attack.” She throws an amused glance over her shoulder where Harley is settled on the floor surrounded by homework, trying not to make it obvious that he’s listening to them. 

Peter steps inside and drops his backpack, his bookbag, and the rest of his crap.   
  


It’s all so heavy the floor actually cracks.

Peter doesn’t even acknowledge it. “So?” 

Nat perched on his desk and tosses a projector into the middle of the room. It flickers to life and displays a picture of a disgruntled looking man: black beanie, glasses, a distinctly Russian scowl. 

“And?” 

Nat gives him a look. “That’s Dr. Van Dijk, the asshole who was running the facility we took down last month. I’ve been trying to track him down ever since but he’s been particularly… evasive.”

Peter gets a closer look. There’s nothing overtly evil about Van Dijk that strikes the naked eye. Peter had seen those kids though. He’d seen where they’d been kept, seen their terrified faces. 

“You have a lead?”

“London,” Nat says. “We leave tonight.”

Harley finally speaks for the first time. “Woah, woah, _what?_ Peter, what about Friday? What about the plan?”

“I’ll just have to make the tests up.”

“Dude. You’re putting your degree on the line for this guy?”

“He’s evil!”

“ _So?_ ” 

Peter squints. “You wanna come?”

Harley blinks back. He looks at Natasha. “So you said we leave tonight?”

* * *

“You know, I never cleared your carry-on bag.”

Peter looks over at Harley. He’s claimed one of the queen sized beds in the room adjoining theirs and is hunched over his laptop, typing at top speed. 

“Suck my ass, Nat.”

Natasha rolls her eyes. “I’m just saying, I don’t know him. I don’t like working with people I don’t know.”

“You didn’t know me when we first worked together,” he points out.

“Yeah, but you came with Tony’s stamp of approval, which was good enough for me.”

Peter raises an eyebrow.

“I might have done a _little_ digging,” she confesses. “But that doesn’t change the fact that this is a high stakes mission and a newbie tagging a long is the last thing either of us need.”

Peter falls onto his back and rubs his eyes tiredly. He can feel a headache coming on. “Harley comes with _my_ seal of approval, okay? Besides, he’s just keeping an eye on things for us.”

Nat leans over him. “If this goes south, I’m blaming you.”

“Liar. You’ll blame yourself and eat your feelings with peanut butter sandwiches and whiskey.”

Her eyes narrow. “How do you know that?” 

“I’ve _met_ you.”

Nat grunts. She rolls onto her back beside him. They both glare at the opulent chandelier hanging from the ceiling for a good while. Peter, even after years of living with a multi-billionaire, still feels out of place staying in a hotel like the Ritz. 

“He’ll be fine,” Peter says into the silence. 

Nat hums. “He’d better be.”

* * *

“Target is on the move.” 

Peter doesn’t look up from the gun he’s cleaning. “How suspicious does he look on a scale of one to ten?”

“I’d say eight.”

“That’s pretty high. Think we should go down and tail him?”

“Probably.”

* * *

Nat and Peter follow after Van Dijk through Green Park. 

They keep a fair distance but it’s so crowded this time of day, it’s actually fairly easy to blend in. Peter is pretending to talk on the phone while he walks because hey, improv is fun and it’s always hilarious when he can make Nat crack. 

She’s about a hundred feet away, walking at a leisurely pace with her headphones in. 

“Your stage name is Amanda,” Harley had informed her as they left the hotel. “But everything you say has to be random because it can’t be obvious you’re talking to each other.”

“I told you I never wanted a damn dog,” she hisses now. “God, you always make everything about _you_.”

Peter counters with: “Yeah, see, but that’s where you’re wrong. Manchester United wouldn’t know the right end of the field if it weren’t pointed out to them.”

“I said she was my friend. Just because I bitched about her doesn’t mean she wasn’t my _friend_.” 

“We could go down to the pub and watch rugby instead.”

“You didn’t have to _fuck her._ ”

It takes all of Peter’s restraint not to gasp, or worse: burst into laughter. 

  
Dr. Van Dijk begins to walk faster. So does Peter. It it comes down to a chase his enhancements will ensure he wins.

“Excuse me, sir!”

Peter whips around just in time to see Natasha holding something out. He tries not to make it obvious that he’s watching their entire exchange. Natasha has to call out three more times before Van Dijk finally turns around. 

“You dropped your wallet,” she informs him, holding out the prop one they’d bought at a second hand shop. 

And Van Dijk looks down at the wallet that is _so_ not his and nods quickly, “Yes, yes, thank you.”

He takes it. Smiles. Hurries away. 

“How’d he look?” Harley asks through the comms. 

“Pale,” Natasha informs him. “Sweaty.”

“Gross.”

“Think he’s about to do something drastic?” 

Nat shakes her head. Her face has turned to marble. “Worse. I think he already has.”

* * *

It doesn’t really roll the way they want it to. 

Then again, it rarely ever does. 

Van Dijk leads them through a twisted maze of buildings, alleyways, and backstreets, until finally he ducks into the mouth of a closed off subway entrance. 

Nat edges toward it. She touches the split chain that had obviously been keeping it shut. 

“I don’t like this.”

“Apparently that place was built in 1926 but never opened,” Harley informs them. “Something about how the area isn’t structurally sound.”

“Oh, great,” Peter mutters as he follows Nat inside, “let’s go get squashed by an entire fucking street!”

Turns out, it’s much worse.

The way down to the station is pitch black. Peter relies on his senses to navigate the stairwell. Natasha ends up behind him, one hand on his shoulder and the other, presumably, holding her gun. 

It takes Peter a second to adjust to the light when they finally reach it. 

He’s never seen a subway station this clean. There is no graffiti, no trash, no lingering smell of human waste. There’s no evidence that anyone has ever been here at all. 

Well, except for the single train car sitting creepily on the tracks.

Nat advances toward it, muscles taught, eyes scanning each end of the tunnel. 

The doors to the car are wide open. It looks as pristine as the station, sleek and modern and so fucking weird. 

“Where the hell did he go?” Peter wonders aloud. 

Nat’s only reply is a grunt. She pokes her head inside the car. 

“Oh my god, please don’t tell me you’re actually gonna go inside the creepy murder nest?!”

She steps inside. 

“Relax, Petya,” she says, and then the doors slide shut with a hiss, separating them both. 

“Nat?!”

“ _Fuck_. Help me open them.”

Peter tries not to lose his cool. They’ve been in way worse situations and there’s no real reason to panic just yet. It’s not like—

“Wait, I hear something.”

Peter stops trying to pry open the doors. They won’t budge for some reason. He watches Nat through the windows as she creeps through the rows of seats. Then she kneels beside one and—

“Bomb.”

“Are you kidding me?!”

“No, Mr. Parker, I assure you I am far from kidding.”

Peter rounds. At the edge of the left-hand tunnel, Van Dijk stands with his hands in the pockets of his trench coat. He is not smiling, but his face is set with determination, as if all of this is just so unfortunate but equally as necessary. 

“What you are is insane,” Peter snaps before he can stop himself. It’s exactly what you’re _not_ supposed to say to someone as unstable as this, but he’s just so pissed off and so _done_ with this _bullshit_. 

“Insane? That’s what you’d call me?”

“Well, kidnapping a bunch of kids sounds pretty off the rails to me.” He pauses. “No pun intended.”

“I was trying to cure them!” Van Dijk roars. Oh yeah, big anger issues there. Peter doesn’t know how to describe his face other than Vernon Dursley Purple. 

“Cure them,” he repeats slowly, stepping forward. “Of what.”

“Their irregularities, of course. What else?”

“Irregularities,” Peter repeats, stunned. He steps down off the platform, ignoring Nat’s warnings in his ear. “You mean their gifts?”

Van Dijk’s face twists. “If that’s what you call them. I say they are destructive, violent, unpredictable. Children, Mr. Parker, have no ability to master those singular irregularities if they are alone in them. They will grow volatile, unstable. They will reap cities, reduce towns to rubble.”

Peter is twenty feet away now. He can see the way Van Dijk is shaking—not with fear but with anger, with pure unadulterated fury. 

“So you tried to take their gifts away? How?”

Usually, if you can get a villain talking they’ll tell you all you need to know. But Van Dijk isn’t just a villain; he’s a scientist too, trying to justify the years he spent torturing little kids to make them ‘normal’ again. 

So Van Dijk spits. “It matters not. What matters is that you ruined my life’s work! You, with your powers, Mr. Parker, have proven everything I have believed since—”

“Since?”

Van Dijk backtracks. “It doesn’t matter. What matters is eradicating the world of people like _you_.”

Then he runs.

“Go!” Nat shouts, and he can hear her even without the comms. “I’ve got this, just _go!_ ”

So Peter heads after the crazy evil scientist, tuning out the sounds of voices in his ears, two people speaking rapidly back and forth. There’s just the wind in his ears, the sound of heavy footfalls, his own heartbeat and Van Dijk’s fifty feet in front of him. 

He follows Van Dijk all the way through the tunnel, up another stairwell that takes them into a crowded train station. Van Dijk hurries through the crowds of people, knocking shopping bags out of hands, pushing, shoving, leaving Peter a trail to follow. 

Up another flight of stairs, and another, and then they are on the roof.

“You can’t stop it, Mr. Parker!” Van Dijk shouts. 

The wind is whipping around him. Peter knows what’s coming next. 

“Nothing can stop it! Humanity is forever lost to your kind!”

Van Dijk jumps straight off the side of the building before Peter can even try to save him. 

* * *

Four hours later and Peter’s pants are rolled up to the knee. He swings his legs back and forth, staring down vacantly at the unnaturally blue rippling water. 

“Long day?”

Peter barely looks up when Nat settles next to him. 

“You could say that.”

She hums. They sit there for a moment, both breathing, both alive. He tilts his head back to take in the glass ceiling of the pool hall, watches the rain splatter against it and run down in heavy droves. His throat burns from chlorine and alcohol. 

“You made the right call,” Nat says eventually. “Bringing Keener, I mean. He came in handy.”

Peter looks at her with a raised eyebrow and a hollow smirk. “What was that?”

“Shut up.” She bumps their shoulders together. “I’m just trying to say… maybe I was a little harsh.”

“I’m not the one you should be apologising to.”

“Apologising? Who said that’s what I was doing?”

“ _God_.”

Nat laughs. She swings her legs in time with his and then scoops up the bottle of scotch he’d set aside. “What’s got you half deep into this?”

He looks at her for a long moment, debating whether or not it’s stupid. In the end his insecurities win out (which isn’t really a surprise). 

“Do you think I’m dangerous?” 

“Yes,” Nat replies swiftly. “In a good way.”

“There’s a good kind of dangerous?”

“There are good and bad kinds of everything. You’re dangerous to your enemies, not to the rest of the world.”

“I don’t have enemies,” Peter mutters, snatching the bottle back. “You point and I shoot.”

For some reason that makes her stiffen. “Don’t put this on me.”

“That’s not…” he sighs. “I’m just saying, I don’t actively seek this shit out. I don’t have an agenda here.”

“Neither do I. I’m just trying to make the world a safer place to live in.”

“It’s not safe,” he blurts. “We’ll never be safe again, Nat, and we’re not—humanity isn’t the biggest threat we’re facing.”

Her mouth has crested into a frown. “Thanos is gone, Peter.”

“Yeah.” He takes another drink. “He was just the one we knew about.”

“Peter—”

“We can’t protect earth from outside threats, we can’t protect it from the inside either. We’re running around slamming lids on pots of boiling water, Nat. I don’t know… What did I do today but kill a guy?”

“You didn’t kill him. That wasn’t on you.”

“What he was doing was wrong, yeah,” Peter goes on, “but we’re not playing judge and jury here. We don’t have the right to decide what justice should be served, _if_ it should be served. We don’t just get to police people by a code of conduct we haven’t even established—” 

Nat grabs the back of his neck and makes him look at her. “That’s not what we’re doing. We stop bad guys, that’s it. There’s no need to get philosophical about a job like this, okay? It’ll only drive you crazy.”

His head hangs. Nat gently pries the bottle out of his grip and sets it aside. 

“This job… it gets to you. It gets to me. Always has, no matter what side I was on. Somehow you always end up feeling more like a weapon than a human being.”

He raises his head. “I don’t want to hurt people.”

“Neither do I, but sometimes it’s necessary. Sometimes you have to hurt the people who plan on hurting others.”

They fall into another lull. Peter watches steam curl off of the surface of the heated water. 

“You’re not backing out on me, are you?”

“What? _No_.” Peter shakes his head. “No way. I just… I feel like I’m losing sight of the person I used to be. Like every time I see something like that, it changes me just a little bit more.”

“Yeah.” Nat nods. “That feeling never really goes away.”

She nudges him. “I need you.”

He raises an eyebrow. “ _You?_ Needing _me?_ Why Natasha—”

Nat pushes him into the pool. 

* * *

Peter returns to his and Harley’s room soaked to the bone and still drying off with a towel.

Harley lifts his head. They stare at each other for a minute.

“Burger?” his friend asks, mouth full.

Peter gratefully takes one. When their plates have been reduced to just piles of fries, Peter says, “You were really good today, you know. If you hadn’t helped Nat with the bomb—”

“You don’t have to thank me, man.”

“I’m not thanking you,” Peter corrects. “Well, per se. I’m… do you wanna join the squad?”

“The what?”

“The spidey squad.”

Harley blinks. Then he snorts with laughter, and like always it makes Peter grin even if he doesn’t get the joke. 

“Y’all really—y’all call yourselves _that?_ Oh my god, oh my _god_. Please. Can I? I wanna call myself Brown Recluse.”

Peter kicks him. “Are you in or are you out, asshole?”

Harley snorts a fry down the vacuum tube he calls a throat. “In.”

“Good. Cool.”

“You’re fuckin’ batshit by the way,” Harley says. “Chasing after that crazy motherfucker all on your own.”

Peter shrugs. 

Harley’s face changes. Some of the humor leaves it. 

“You okay?”

“I’m fine,” Peter lies, and it is so easy it terrifies him. “I’m gonna shower, okay?”

“Yeah,” Harley nods. “Okay.”

* * *

The quinjet touches down in the compound and Peter is the first one off. He absolutely hates being cooped up for long periods of time and for the last twenty minutes he’d resorted to pacing on the ceiling to work off his energy. 

Unexpectedly, he runs into Rhodey in the hallway. 

“Peter? What are you doing here?! I was just about to drive to MIT to pick you up and—”

It’s at this point that Natasha and Harley have come into his line of sight. Rhodey sighs. “I’m not even gonna ask. Just—would you help me set up?”

“Set up? For what?”

“It’s Pepper’s birthday,” Rhodey reminds him. “What, you didn’t forget, did you?”

“Forget? Me? What? No way. _No_. Absolutely not.”

“ _Peter_.”

“I’ve been _busy_.”

“Did you even get her a gift?”

“I mean, yeah, but it’s back in my dorm.”

Rhodey is pulling out his phone in a heartbeat. “Hey, Happy? I need you to do me a favor.”

* * *

Later Peter stands next to Rhodey in the kitchen, chopping parsley with careful precision. Harley and Nat went off to do whatever it was Rhodey had tasked them with so he and Peter are alone together.

“Hey Rhodey?”

“Yeah, little man?”

Peter bites the inside of his cheek before asking, “Why all the fuss? I mean—not that I don’t care, it’s just the past couple years Pep hasn’t really done much more than tell me what kind of cake she wants and order fancy Italian to eat in her pajamas.”

Rhodey sighs. “Listen… she’d kill me if she knew I was telling you this, but it’s been really hard on her since you went away to college. Now, I don’t want you to feel guilty or drop out or whatever—”

“But—”

“No buts,” Rhodey insists. “Just… trust, okay? She needs this. She needs all her people in one place and she needs to know we care enough to put effort like this in.”

Peter nods slowly. “Yeah.” 

Rhodey is silent for a second. Then, “You said she eats Italian every year on her birthday?”

And Peter had never thought about it before, not really. He’d never thought about the _significance_ of it, but he does now and his shoulders sag.

“Tony used to make her Italian for their anniversary,” Rhodey informs him. “And her birthday. And his, because he never trusted anyone else to cook it. And he’d even serve spaghetti at Christmas—something his mom used to do to stick it to American traditions, I think.”

Peter chews on that. 

“May used to buy these little Italian desserts all the time—tartufo. Maybe we could make those?”

Rhodey’s face is soft when he nods and says, “Yeah, definitely.”

* * *

“Having trouble?”

MJ is already scowling when she looks up at him, but Peter is hardly deterred by it after dating her for two years. He steps deeper into the room, kicking the door shut on his way. 

“I don’t need help.”

Peter sits across from her anyway and raises a brow at the mess of crumpled wrapping paper. “Are you sure?”

“ _Yes_.”

Peter stills. There’s this feeling he gets when he’s pissed MJ off—it’s a little different from the one that comes with angering Nat or Pepper or Harley. It’s like his heart drops instead of his stomach and all the hair on his body stands on end, like everything is suddenly in jeopardy and the world is gonna end in five seconds if he doesn’t fix it in time.

“I didn’t mean it looked bad.”

MJ glares because they both know it absolutely looks bad. She’s horrible at wrapping gifts. 

He backtracks. “I just mean—it’s _okay_ if it looks bad—”

“I know, Peter. I don’t need you to tell me that.”

He feels like he’s grappling for a handhold on a cliff face. “Did I do something to piss you off?”

And just like that MJ vaults to her feet, gift forgotten. “Did you piss me off? Well, I don’t know. Did you just go on some random mission to England without telling me or asking if I wanted to come?”

“Uh… I guess?”

“Then _yeah_ , I’m pissed off!”

“MJ—”

“No, listen,” she holds her hands up, “I have proven myself over and over again, and you keep telling me that you think I’m strong, that you believe in me, and normally I think maybe you’re not even lying. But it’s shit like this that makes me second guess that, _and_ myself, and frankly I think that’s bullshit.” 

“Okay, hold on,” he stands too, because they have a silent unspoken thing about not domineering over the other person. “I wasn’t trying to like, actively exclude you here. Nat didn’t need that much manpower—”

“But you brought _Keener?!_ ”

Peter pinches his brow. “That’s—no—that’s not—”

“Oh? Okay, so explain to me what it is, then.” 

“Okay, first of all, _I_ didn’t even know I was going on the mission okay? Harley only came because he was right there for the briefing, and even then Nat didn’t want him along—” 

“You still brought him! You didn’t think to call _me_ instead?!”

“I had no idea what you had going on! God, _I_ shouldn’t have gone! Besides, you didn’t wanna be there, trust me.”

“See, that’s the thing that I’m telling you: I did want to be there, I wanted to be able to help—”

“Oh, so you would’ve enjoyed watching a Finnish evil scientist throw himself off the side of a building? Or, better yet, you could’ve gotten stuck in a train car with Nat and almost blown up! That really sounds like a lifestyle worth chasing after to me!” 

They both fall silent. His chest is heaving. He’s never, ever yelled at her like that. He doesn’t know if he’s ever sounded so bitter in his entire life. 

MJ shakes her head. “Peter… _what?_ ”

“It sounds worse than it was.”

“Uh, are you kidding me? You watched some dude kill himself and you actually wanna try telling me it _didn’t_ fuck you up?”

He falls onto the bed and covers his face with his hands. “I just… it was spur of the moment, it was only supposed to be a two man job—”

“I don’t care about that anymore,” she hisses, kneeling on the floor and then gently prying his hands free of his face. “Peter, there’s no way you’re okay right now.”

“I’m fine.”

“ _Dude_.”

“There’s no room to not be okay,” he blurts, and he hadn’t even realised it was the truth until it is cast out between them. “What else can I be? I can’t just—I’m working, I’m trying to be there for Pep and for Morgan and for you—”

“You don’t have to be there for me—”

“Of course I have to be. I _want_ to be. You don’t let me but I wanna be.”

MJ rests her elbows on his knees. “I’m not… I’m not trying to shut you out, I’m trying to make it easier.”

“But see, that just makes it _worse_.”

“Then let me be there for you too.” She is practically begging, a hand on his cheek to cover the tears there. “Let me help you, you stupidhead. Talk to me.”

He tries to but the words won’t come. Maybe there’s just nothing to say. Maybe all of that heavy he’s always carrying around in his stomach is just gonna be there forever and he’ll have to carry the weight of it for the rest of his life. 

“I’m just so tired,” he whispers. “I’m tired. I want everything to go back to the way it was. I don’t know—I don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t know how to be this—this person that keeps changing and I don’t know if I’m good enough for you anymore, if I deserve you, if I can… _god_ , I don’t know.”

MJ, both hands on his cheeks now, warm and close and real and home, touches their foreheads together and then says, “This thing, you and me, it’s not about deserve. It’s not about good enough. It’s about I love you and you love me back, and that’s it. Just because you’re low doesn’t mean I don’t love you. Just because you piss me off doesn’t mean I don’t love you. God, I’m _always_ gonna love you, you infuriating asshole.”

Peter sniffs sharply and then plants a lingering kiss to the crown of her head. 

“I think we need to get better at talking to each other,” he whispers. 

“Yeah,” she agrees, somewhere against the crook of his neck. “We really do.”

“Talk to me now. What do you need?”

“You need to include me more. I fucking refuse to sit on the sidelines waiting for you to come back like some forties housewife, okay? This isn’t World War Two and I am _not_ that girl. And I can’t keep tailing you because plane tickets are fucking expensive. So just… take me. Let me help you.”

Peter nods. “What else?”

“I wanna see you more. I miss you all the fucking time. It’s not even cute, it’s like, I can’t think and I can’t sleep sometimes and food has no taste and—just… I just miss you.”

Peter absorbs that. For a long minute they just breathe, and the smell of her chamomile shampoo is everywhere, and the back of her neck is warm. He could fall asleep like this. 

“What about from me?” She whispers. “What do you need?”

“Just this,” he says. “I just need to know what’s going on inside your head, because I can’t read your mind and I don’t… I don’t want things to build up. So if you’re mad at me just say it. Say why and I can try to fix it.”

“Okay.” 

She leans back. Some of her curls are sticking to her cheeks from the tears drying there and so Peter brushes them away. He kisses her, too, because it feels like they’re making a promise here and he wants to make sure it’s an official one. 

“I’m sorry,” he whispers.

MJ nods. “I’m sorry, too.”

And just like that the feeling is gone. He is sinking back down into himself, secure again. 

Peter glances down at the present. 

“So what’d you get her?”

“I didn’t. I mean, I made it. It’s just a bunch of Morgan’s drawings. She makes them all the time when I babysit her and I just… my mom always used to throw mine away, but they’re supposed to be kept. I don’t know. Maybe it’s dumb.”

Peter shakes his head. “It’s not dumb. She’s gonna love it, I promise.”

* * *

“You didn’t need to surprise me you know. I mean the dinner was enough, there was no need to jump out like that.”

Peter grins. He passes Pepper the bowl of salad greens. “You’re just embarrassed we made you scream.”

“I’m not embarrassed,” Pepper argues. “But I came this close to breaking my Louis Vuitton heel and trust me, Peter, if that had happened there would have been hell to pay.”

Peter laughs. At his side Morgan squirms impatiently, so he lets her climb into his lap like he knows she’s been trying to do since she and Pepper had arrived. She’d been excited to see him at first, but now her head falls tiredly against his shoulder and it isn’t long before her breathing evens out. 

It’s at this point, when the dinner is actually going well and Pepper is genuinely happy, laughing at an old college story of Rhodey’s, that Steve Rogers walks in.

“Oh,” he says, and averts his eyes like he just walked in on someone in the bathroom. “I uh, I didn’t know—”

“Steve,” Nat says quickly, with a dangerous edge. She rises. “I didn’t think you were coming until tomorrow.” 

“Something came up and I just—”

This is the part where Peter reaches for the bottle of wine and pours himself a huge glassful, which he proceeds to down in about six seconds flat. 

Nat and Steve are talking in low voices, but Peter can hear them like they’re standing two feet away. 

“You should’ve called,” Nat tells him. 

“It’s my home too, Nat—”

“Still, this really isn’t the best time for you to be here.”

“I just need to pick up a bag—”

“Let me ask you something, Rogers,” Harley pipes up, and _oh god._ “How do you sleep at night?”

Peter pours himself another glass. 

Rogers blinks, dumbfounded. “I—pardon? Who are you? Who is he?”

“Who gives a fuck,” Harley says. “Just answer the damn question. How do you sleep at night knowing you turned your back on one of your best friends?”

Peter and Nat proceed to have one of their telepathic conversations. She gives him her, _Do something_ look, and Peter replies with a shrug. _I’m not his keeper. Besides, he doesn’t listen to me anyway._

“Listen, what happened between Tony and I was a helluva lot more complicated than what I’m sure was disclosed to you,” Steve says. “Now if you’ll excuse me—”

“No, I’d really like to know the answer to that question myself, please.”

Peter rounds on Pepper, wide eyed, absolutely _shook_. 

“Pepper—”

She holds up a hand to shut him up without breaking eye contact with Steve. 

And Peter, who is so tired, who is even tired of hating Steve Rogers, quietly downs his second glass of wine and pours himself a third. 

Steve, for his part, looks like he knows how thin the ice is beneath his feet. He glances at Nat and then at Pepper. “Is there any way we could discuss this in private, Pepper?”

“No, right here is fine I think. Please. Everyone here would like to know.”

Peter would not like to know. Peter would like to crawl into a hole and die right about now, but he will not leave Pepper alone with Steve. Not because he thinks he will hurt her, but because he’s worried she’ll hurt _herself_ if she goes too far with this. 

Steve scrubs a hand down his face. “God... I don’t sleep. That’s not because of—I just don’t need it. Even if I did, I don’t think I would. I think about it—Thanos, Siberia—it’s not something I plan on forgetting any time soon. I cared about Tony, I still do. But I’m sorry, I really don’t have time for this.”

Pepper is rigid. She opens her mouth to say something but Peter cuts in. “Pep, let him go.”

She grits her teeth but nods. Steve ducks away as quickly as possible and Peter listens to his heartbeat grow fainter and fainter before he knocks back the last of his wine and rounds on Harley. 

“What the hell was the point of that?”

Harley rolls his eyes. “What, are you gonna defend him after what he did to Tony?”

“No, I don’t give a fuck about Rogers, Keener, I’m talking about you unnecessarily provoking him. What, like everyone in this place hasn’t suffered enough? Like we need to keep fighting? _God_.”

Peter stands. He readjusts Morgan in his arms and then leaves with the intention of putting her down properly for a nap. 

He’s halfway down the hall when Nat catches up to him. 

“What’s up with you?”

“Nothing is up with me.”

“Yeah? Cuz last I checked, Rogers was just about the last person on the planet you wanted to be around.”

“That hasn’t changed.”

“So why’d you defend him?”

“I didn’t.”

“Peter, don’t bullshit me.”

He glares as he slowly lowers Morgan onto her bed. “I’m not bullshitting you. It’s just… the more I think about what I saw on that tape, the more it makes sense to me why Rogers acted the way he did. I’m not saying it was right—it was really, _really_ shitty—but… I think he really loved him. Bucky, I mean. Like, really loved him.” 

Nat’s mouth hangs open a little bit like she wants to argue but can’t think of anything to say. Then her face scrunches up. 

Peter goes on, “If it came down to it. Me and Harley—if it were MJ in Barnes’ shoes, I mean… I know what I would do.” 

He pauses. 

“Wouldn’t you? For Clint?”

“I didn’t love Clint like that.”

Peter shoots her a disbelieving look. “That’s why you leave a dozen times a month chasing after his shadow.”

“I owe him a debt—”

“Nat.”

She chokes like the truth is just too much, too compromising. Peter shakes his head. “I’m not here to push you. I’m just saying… it wasn’t our fight. We can try to humiliate Rogers until we’re blue in the face, but what good would that do? Where does that get anyone? He’s already lost the most important person in the world to him, right?”

Peter shrugs. “I just don’t see the point in making him suffer more than he already has.” 

With one last stroke of Morgan’s hair, Peter slips out of the room. 

* * *

  
Later, after Happy’s driven MJ home and Nat’s retired to the gym to kick the shit out of a sandbag, Peter finds Pepper curled up on the couch with the same bottle of wine he’d been working on earlier. 

“Before you start on me with a lecture—”

“I’m not gonna lecture you.”

“I don’t know what came over me, I just get so angry when I see him—”

“Which I understand.”

“I know it was wrong—”

“ _Pepper_ ,” Peter says, throwing himself down beside her. “I get it.”

Her mouth closes. She squints at him and then sets aside her book. “Are you okay?”

Peter is so fucking sick of that question. Of course he’s not okay. He’s running on practically no sleep and trying to accomplish a thousand impossible things at the same time, trying to save everyone, protect everyone, take care of them. How can he add himself to the mix? How can he ever be okay again?

When he doesn’t answer Pepper takes his hand. “You seem sad. You’ve seemed sad for a while, actually. I thought… I thought you were doing better. What happened, baby?”

Peter closes his eyes. 

He wants to cry.

He really, _really_ does. Maybe it’s just because of how exhausted he is, or how much work he’s gonna have to make up when he goes back to MIT, or maybe it’s the leftover shock of seeing Steve. 

But he doesn’t. He breathes it back and then looks at her, trying for a smile. “You never opened your present from me.”

Her shoulders drop a little. Maybe she’d been hoping to get a little more out of him. He knows he’s worrying her and he knows it’s not fair, but he lives with the absolute certainty that if she did know what was going on inside his head, if she did know what he spent half his waking hours working on, it would break her more than the anxiety of seeing him like this.

“My present?” she repeats softly.

Peter leans forward and takes it from the small stack on the coffee table. Pepper turns it over gently in her hands and then carefully pulls the paper back.

“Oh my god, Pep, just rip into it.”

She laughs. It makes him smile. 

Inside is a very small box, within which lies a golden heart shaped locket. Pepper picks it up like it’s made of glass, open mouthed. She clicks it open.

“Why aren’t you in here?”

Peter shrugs. Despite everything, he’d still felt strange adding his own picture beside the one of Morgan. 

“I just—”

“I’m putting in a picture of you.”

Peter laughs. “It’s your locket, I won’t stop you.”

“Thank you,” she whispers, wrapping her arms around him. “God, thank you. It’s beautiful.”

“You don’t think it’s cheesy?”

“ _No_. I’m gonna wear it every day.”

Peter kisses her cheek and takes a moment to just breathe, safe in her arms for just a minute. Nothing else matters but them and the pain that runs concurrently between them, the shared electric charge of grief. 

She is not okay either. It is hard for her like it’s hard for him; to wake up in the morning, to breathe, to keep going, to keep fighting. 

But they made it another day, and god help them, they’ll make it through tomorrow too. 

And maybe one day they won’t have to remember to breathe, to fight, to survive. Maybe one day they can just live. 


	2. MISSION: HIKO DESERT

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “MJ, you are _not_ gonna believe this.”
> 
> “Peter, I have a test tomorrow—”
> 
> “MJ, I’m telling you, this is more important. This is like, everything we’ve ever been waiting for.”
> 
> “Dude—”
> 
> “MJ, do you wanna break into Area 51 with me and Carol Danvers?”
> 
> There’s a pause. 
> 
> “Fucking marry me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, beans, welcome to another installment of Spidey Squad! I laughed like the entire time I was writing this, so I hope u guys enjoy :)

“Hey, Peter Parker.”

It’s pretty rare that anyone can actually sneak up on him well enough to get him to jump, but that’s what Carol Danvers does on a quiet night at the compound. It’s Friday and Peter doesn’t have another lecture until Tuesday, so he’d decided to take a break from campus life and driven upstate for the weekend. 

He’d been under the impression that he was alone in the enormous building, which is why Danvers actually gets the drop on him for once. 

Only when Peter looks up, it’s just her blue-tinted hologram standing in the middle of Nat’s office that he sees—hence the lack of warning from his spidey sense. 

“Danvers,” he says, homework forgotten. “What’s up?”

“Not much. I might need your help with something though.”

That’s a sentence he literally never thought he’d hear come out of her mouth. She, Carol Danvers, the most powerful person in like the entire freaking _universe,_ needs his help. Peter raises a disbelieving eyebrow. 

“It’s just a small—” Carol sighs, frustrated. “There’s a Chitaurian device that I’ve managed to trace back to Earth, but getting a reading on its _exact_ location is proving to be difficult.”

Peter coughs. “Aren’t those things, like, super explosive?”

He doesn’t actually need her answer. He knows from personal experience that they’re totally, absolutely explosive. 

Carol shrugs. “In the hands of a moron, maybe.”

“Cool, cool, cool,” Peter nods, “no doubt, no doubt. Are you sure you want _my_ help?”

She squints. “Where’s Romanoff?”

“Uh, Yugoslavia, I think. Or maybe Slovenia, I don’t remember.”

“She got a lead on Barton?”

Peter hadn’t known Carol was in on that. He shifts uncomfortably, not sure what to say. 

Carol shrugs. “Okay, well, if you’re the only one around then I guess you’ll have to do. I’ll make the jump in thirty minutes.”

“Wait,” Peter cuts in, “you do have _some_ idea of where this thing is, right?”

Carol glances at some kind of display on her wrist. “Uh, yeah, somewhere in Nevada. Not far from Las Vegas, actually.” 

Peter almost falls out of his chair. 

“Oh my god,” he says. “You want to break into Area 51.”

* * *

“MJ, you are _not_ gonna believe this.”

“Peter, I have a test tomorrow—”

“MJ, I’m telling you, this is more important. This is like, everything we’ve ever been waiting for.”

“ _Dude_ —”

“Do you wanna break into Area 51 with me and Carol Danvers?”

There’s a pause. 

“Fucking marry me.”

* * *

“Nebula.”

She doesn’t look _surprised_ to see him, exactly, but there’s a stiffening that occurs, a straightening of her cybernetic spine. She jerks her chin in his direction and then continues ordering Rocket around the ship. 

It’s been a while since Peter’s even seen the Benetar, much less stepped foot on it. Climbing up the ramp after it had descended, letting the ship swallow him whole, hadn’t really been a conscious decision. His body had sort of just moved on its own, subconsciously seeking some form of closure. 

Regardless it’s unnerving. Any charm he might’ve found had worn off a long time ago, somewhere in the chaos between Titan and Earth. 

“Surprised you didn’t think of it, being ex-Air Force and all.” 

Carol shrugs. “Yeah, well, my brain is still a little jumbled from getting microwaved back in ’89. Anyway, I went there once with… with Fury. That’s where P.E.G.A.S.U.S.’ base was located.”

Peter absorbs that. After a minute he asks, “How have you been holding up?”

“What, since the snap?” Another shrug. “It’s not like I really lost anyone important.”

“ _Danvers._ ”

Her jaw locks. “It’d been a long time already. Fury and I… it’d been a long time.”

He doesn’t know what to say to that. It’s not like it’s really his place to get her to talk, or anything. They barely know each other. 

Carol slips past him. Peter follows. “So what exactly are we looking for?”

“Just an energy core. If paired with the right tech it can power cities for decades. C-53 isn’t that advanced yet, so it’s not like you’ll miss it.”

“But it’ll still be hard to get,” Peter points out. “I mean, one of humanity’s main weaknesses is curiosity, you know? Adam and Eve and all that crap. Just because we don’t understand something or have no use for it doesn’t mean the government’s just gonna hand it over.”

Carol stops on the tarmac and narrows her eyes. Slowly the corner of her mouth turns up. “I like you.”

Peter is stammers a little as they walk inside. “I, uh…”

“Don’t say it back. You’ll just embarrass yourself.”

“Sure, sure.” He bites his tongue. “So what’s that?”

“What, this?” Carol throws the gigantic canvas sack she’d been carrying down on the countertop in the communal kitchen. “Laundry.”

“Oh.”

* * *

“Do you think asking for her autograph would be like, dorky or weird?”

Peter’s nose wrinkles up. 

“Yeah, yeah, you’re night,” MJ nods to herself. “No, she’s a colleague. She’s a peer. It would be weird. We’re co-workers.”

Despite himself Peter can’t help smiling. She’s totally eating this up. 

“You think she’s into girls?”

“ _Dude!”_

“ _What?!_ Please, like you could actually _blame_ me. I mean, look at her.”

Peter doesn’t look even when she does. He keeps his eyes on MJ, grinning faintly. “You’d really kick me to the curb for Danvers?”

“Who wouldn’t?”

“Wow. That’s real love right there.”

“Oh, shut up. What if it were Thor?”

Peter tilts his head to the side and takes a second to actually consider it. “Yeah, okay, you got me there.”

* * *

Three hours later (because Carol had to wait for her clothes to dry) and they touch down in the middle of the Hiko desert. 

“What a fuckin’ dump,” Rocket observes.

“Agreed,” says Nebula shortly. 

“I just love the way you two have bonded,” Peter tells them, rolling his eyes. “Like seriously, it really warms the heart.”

Rocket waves him off with his usual ‘eh, shut up’. He pulls out a pair of binoculars and squints through them. “Are you serious? _This_ is the hole in the wall you called me all the way from Sector Seven to raid? What the _fuck,_ Danvers?!”

Carol grunts. She snatches the scopes. “It’s not as lowkey as it seems from the outside. The place is crawling with sharp shooters and who knows what else. We need to do this job quickly and quietly. If it’s possible, I don’t want them to even notice that core is gone until we’ve left.”

“If you wanted quick and quiet you shouldn’t have brought him,” Nebula remarks, glaring at Rocket. 

Rocket glares back. He even growls a little. “Like you’re one to talk. You can’t even move your arms without creakin’ like a rusted tin can.”

“Okay!” Peter claps his hands together. “What’s the plan?”

* * *

The matter of sneaking in is solved when Rocket produces a silver band for each of them, which he places on their wrists along with the casually dropped proclamation that: “These puppies are charged up for a good thirty minutes—long enough to sneak in and out. Just remember not to break ’em or lose ’em while we do this or we’re fuckin’ screwed.”

Peter puts his on. There’s a hum and a slight electric shock and then just like that, they’re all invisible. 

“Um—”

“ _Be cool,”_ MJ hisses. 

They make their way toward the grounds of the facility. Rocket burrows under the fence while everyone else hops it. Then they set to work. 

Peter climbs the walls and takes out the snipers on the rooftops; MJ and Danvers circle the buildings and knock out every guard posted at their checkpoints; Rocket scurries over to their main target—a large, low building resembling an airplane hangar. It looks pretty inconspicuous from the outside, but every single entrance is sporting high tech scanners (including retinal, fingerprint, and even x-rays to determine distinct skeletal structure). It’s more advanced than anything Peter’s ever encountered before, but Rocket shrugs like it’s no big deal. 

Before they’d left, Peter had suggested that he lose the outfit. 

“What? You want me to walk around naked?! Why the _hell_ would I do that, you pervert—”

“No, he’s right,” Danvers had said. “Trust me: you get caught on those grounds without clothes on, no one’ll look twice at you.”

“Really?” He’d blinked. “Why?”

It had turned out to be the right call. Once or twice he ends up running into a few security details. Like Peter had instructed, he keeps his mouth shut and stays absolutely still, sitting on all fours. 

They shrug and walk away. 

“Holy _shit,_ ” Rocket hisses through the comms. “Did you _see_ that? What the _fuck,_ Parker?! How’d you know they’d just let me go?!”

Peter bites the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing. “Uh, lucky guess?”

“Yeah, well, good intuition,” Rocket says begrudgingly. “Hey Nebula, stick your finger in that hole.”

The conversation that ensues, which Peter is forced to endure while he knocks out half the watch because neither of them think to turn off their comms, goes like this:

“Why would I stick my finger inside of the hole?”

“Just do it!”

“Not unless you provide me with a valid reason to—”

“Hold on, _seriously?_ Three fucking years we’ve been working side by side. Not _once_ have I ever asked you to do something without a valid reason, but now? _Now_ in the middle of a high stakes mission—”

“High stakes? You’ve insisted this entire time the risk was minimal.”

“Just _stick your finger in the hole!”_

_“Why?”_

“I want. To short circuit. The _system.”_

“Oh.”

Nebula sticks her finger in the hole. 

Peter drops down right in-between MJ and Danvers. MJ jumps and socks him in the arm. “Don’t _do that,_ asshole.”

“What, you want me to do a stage entrance every time I walk up to you in the middle of a covert mission?”

She rolls her eyes. “Whatever. Rooftops clear?”

“Crystal. Ground?”

“98%,” Danvers reports, and drop kicks a guy who charges at them from around a corner. She then places one of the circular devices she’d dolled out on his neck. “It’s a serum developed by the Kree,” she’d explained, handing some over to Peter. “Keeps people incapacitated for a good few hours, less if they’ve got a quicker metabolism.”

MJ had looked a little less skeptical. “Think that’s enough time?”

“More than we’ll need.”

Now, Peter is less certain. The base is _huge—_ a good fifty or so buildings sprawled out across miles of property, and that’s just _above ground._ There could and probably is an entire city’s worth of ground to cover down below. 

Rocket’s voice comes through the channel tinny and irritated: “Hey assholes, we’re all clear.” 

* * *

They steal a few trench coats and ID badges from the agents outside. Rocket tries to convince them he’ll _also_ need to steal a few eyeballs in order to bypass further security features, but Nebula shuts him down before he can actually pull out the Eyeball Sucker 3000. 

He’s pretty put out the entire elevator ride down to Level 1.

“We’re starting from the bottom,” Carol tells them as they exit. “It’ll be a small box in a hard to reach place.”

“You’re sure they wouldn’t have like, vaulted it?” MJ asks.

Carol snorts. “Believe me, that thing is like, the _least_ dangerous artifact in this place.”

And that gets Peter thinking, and kind of buzzing, because like every True Nerd he’s watched the Indiana Jones movies like, half a million times. He’s wanted to bust into this place ever since he was like six years old and _god,_ Ned should totally be here. 

And so, when they pass a five-by-five wooden crate with a Nazi eagle and swaztika burned into the side, he has a little bit of a heart attack. 

“Oh my god.”

MJ frowns. “What?”

“Holy _fuck,_ oh my god, I think—I think that’s the arc of the covenant.”

“Really?” Rocket sniffs the crate. Then he tries to lift the lid.

Peter smacks his paw away. “Don’t _open_ it,” he snaps. “It literally says _do not open_ on the side. God, are you trying to get burned to a crisp?”

“ _That’s_ what it does?!” Rocket sniffs with even more enthusiasm. “Oh, man, I’ve gotta look at this now.”

“Guys,” MJ snaps. 

“Nebula, what are you doin’?! Let me go—”

“ _Guys!”_

“What?!” Rocket snaps, one claw outstretched toward the box, the scruff of his neck in Nebula’s unamused grasp. 

MJ points. “Uh, spaceship.”

There is indeed a spaceship. It’s huge, but plainly visible in its own designated area as they’ve reached the last of the floor one shelves. The rest of the level is dedicated to housing it. 

Peter gapes. 

“Holy shit.”

“Man, you Terrans are so fuckin’ weird,” Rocket says as he scampers up to them. “Like I get it, vintage ships are cool. G9-2500, huh? Pretty sure my grandma had one of these.”

Peter blinks. “ _What.”_

Nebula prods it with her toe. A screw falls loose. “Laughable,” she spits. 

“Hey, be nice guys,” Danvers says. “The government hides a lot of stuff from its citizens on Earth. Most of the people here who believed that there was life beyond humanity were ridiculed for a long time. This is big stuff for these two.”

Rocket squints at the ship. “Still, _that_ thing? Gregarians make those.”

“Gregarians?” MJ asks.

“Yeah, little green guys? Big eyes? They’re fuckin’ idiots—like the termites of space. Sorta like what you guys were until a little while ago.”

“ _Dude.”_

Danvers snorts. “Come on, we’ve got a lot of ground to cover.” 

* * *

“Oh, yeah! Now _that’s_ what I’m talkin’ about!”

The next hangar is as empty as the first, thankfully enough; Rocket shouts loud enough for it to echo all the way down to the end of the space. 

It’s occupied by one single aircraft: sleek, black, triangular in shape and hovering about twenty feet off the ground. There is a wheeling staircase leading up to what appears to be the opening, which Rocket quickly scales. 

“Oh, _shit,_ yeah,” he says. “This—now _this_ is impressive. I’ve always wanted to get behind the wheel of one of these bad boys.”

“What… what _is_ it?” MJ asks.

“What _is it?!_ Only like, the coolest spaceship around. Like, Quill’s hunk of junk compared to this? It’s a _joke._ This thing can do fifty consecutive jumps without even making you dizzy! It doesn’t even have _steering!_ The whole thing is configured with your DNA so you can pilot it just by _thinking!_ Man, we _have_ to steal it—”

“Woah, woah, woah, back up,” Peter cuts in. “You can’t just _steal it._ This is government property!”

“Peter,” MJ hisses, “ _ew.”_

“What?! I’m just _saying,_ the goal was to get in and out as quickly as possible without it being obvious we were here. A tiny missing core is one thing—an entire ship? That’s not so easy to get away with.”

“He’s right, it’s off the table Rocket.” Danvers folds her arms across her chest, no-nonsense. 

“Aww, come on! The guy who owned this is probably dead anyway, he won’t miss it!”

“But every single triple letter agency across the U.S. _will,”_ Peter counters, “and yeah, you’d get your fancy ship, but _we’d_ have to deal with the fallout.”

Rocket stares. 

“I don’t see how that’s supposed to persuade me not to steal the ship.”

“Rocket,” Nebula says, “you are being a moron. Get _down.”_

He whines. “Okay, okay. But can I just—can I—can I pee in it?”

“What?! _No!”_

“Dude!”

“You absolute _vermin!”_

Rocket cackles. “It’s too late, I already did! Now _everyone’s_ gonna know that _I_ was the first motherfucker on that baby! _Everyone! AHAHAHA!”_

* * *

Everyone pretty much keeps a fair distance from Rocket after that. 

They don’t run into many people. Apparently most have gathered on the upper floors. Nebula had taken out the security cameras when she’d short circuited the system, but who knows if they’ve even realised yet. Through the vents Peter had caught a snippet of how good the cake was at Phil’s retirement party. 

Maybe the security guy was invited. 

“They’re probably pretty lax about it,” Danvers says to him, like she’s caught the tension in his body. “No one’s ever busted into this place before, right? People get lazy. They get arrogant. They assume that because something’s never happened before, it never will.”

“Hence the chocolate cake.”

She smirks. “I prefer confetti.”

“No way, same!”

* * *

They find the core on Level 3, in a room that’s hardly bigger than a storage closet. There’s a distinct lack of pomp and grandeur there that doesn’t do any justice to the device that nearly blew up Peter’s entire decathlon class once. 

He eyes it warily and almost chokes when Carol casually tosses it up in the air and catches it in a single easy move. 

“Well, that was fun.”

“Uh huh,” he agrees dully.

On their way out they run into a little company: stragglers from the retirement party, all stone cold drunk. They take one look at Rocket and Nebula and burst into collective, delirious laughter.

“Look!” one of them points. “It’s a fucking meerkat!”

“What— _what_ did he just call me?!”

“ _Yooo,_ ” says another one from the crowd, “I knew I shouldn’t have had two of those brownies, man.”

“We should probably, uh,” Peter backs toward the elevator.

“Split,” MJ agrees.

They run for it. 

* * *

“You were pretty quiet today.”

They’re leaning against the ship’s ramp: Nebula is screwing in a loose panel at the junction of her elbow. He’s watching, hopefully not rudely. 

At his words, her hands still. 

“I had a bad week.”

“Yeah?”

“Haven’t been sleeping much.”

Peter bites his lip. “Is there anything that can be done, um…” his eyes drift to the golden flap along the side of her skull; once upon a time he’d put it there after doing his best to fix her wiring in the wake of the disaster on Titan. 

Nebula rolls her shoulders uncomfortably. She keeps trying to screw but can’t seem to get the grip right. 

“Nebula.”

“I don’t want his filthy paws on me.”

“I didn’t mean him.”

She knows that. 

“I know that.”

Peter waits, patiently, one hand extended. After a lengthy pause she hands the screwdriver over. Peter nods. He proceeds in an easy, businesslike fashion because he knows she appreciates a practical attitude when it comes to her software. 

Some of her circuitry is sparking. He’s careful as he rebraids a few wires here, adjusts their placement there. 

When he’s done, Nebula cautiously flexes her arm. 

“Better?”

“Yes.” A pause. “Thank you.”

“Hey, no problem.” He hands the screwdriver over. “And um, I’m here, you know. If you need me to take a look at that.” He taps his own head. “Or if… if you just need me. I’m here.”

Nebula stares with dark eyes like she doesn’t quite understand what he means. 

And then she does. 

And it’s really, really sad the way that he knows without a doubt this is the first time anyone’s ever told her: _you can talk to me._

But two weeks later she calls him, and that makes up for it ten times over. 

* * *

“We’ll be leaving from here,” Danvers announces. She nods to the black SUV she’d broken off to like, steal or whatever. “Grabbed that for you. To be safe I’d drive it a good few miles and then leave it just to throw them off the scent. If you’re lucky they might think it was one of their own.”

Peter nods and takes the keys. 

“Hey, Danvers!”

Carol turns and waits for MJ to catch up. “Listen, um... I know you only came here for the core, but I just wanted to say thank you.”

“Thank me?”

“It’s been... a really long time since I’ve seen him that happy,” MJ confesses. “I just... I think it’s really dope that you did that for him even if you didn’t really mean to.”

Carol’s expression loses some of its edge. She glances at Peter and then smirks. “Yeah, the little dweeb looked like he needed a win.” 

She pauses. 

“You weren’t so bad yourself, by the way. Nice to know there are people down here with a handle on things besides Romanoff.”

MJ has literally no idea what to say to that. Her mouth opens and snaps back shut just as quickly, but Danvers is done talking. She nods at MJ one last time and then ascends the ship’s ramp, the core tucked safely under her arm. 

* * *

They abandon the SUV on the side of the road and walk for a while, until they come across a small building covered in UFO-themed illustrations. It’s called the _Little Alie-Inn,_ so obviously Peter takes MJ by the hand and drags her toward it. 

They order two beers and two burgers and sit on a parking stoop out front. 

“I’ve never actually seen this many stars before,” MJ says, halfway into her burger. 

Peter swallows. He leans back and takes them all in—silver, scattered, glittering; not half as impressive as being _in_ them. These are mere echoes of light. He’s seen them swirling and alive, seen them burning. 

Obviously he’s not about to say that. It’d just be rude and kind of fucked up. 

“I wanted to be an astronomer when I was really little,” he tells her instead, and that grabs her attention. “I had this telescope—well, my dad did. It was this eight inch Meade, super expensive. May said that he’d take me out onto the roof of our complex and he’d tell me about all the constellations and all the stories behind them. I don’t remember that, but I still had the telescope until I was ten and Ben bought be a better one.”

“Do you remember the constellations?”

He nods. Scans the sky. Points. “See that kind of ‘W’ shape? That’s Cassiopeia. She was this queen in Greece who told everyone she was more beautiful than all of Poseidon’s nymphs or something. Apparently he was super insulted by that and hung her upside down in the sky for all of eternity.”

“Poseidon sounds like a douche.”

“Pretty mild guy compared to Zeus, but _anyway—_ right next to it is the end of the Big Dipper, and underneath it, right there—that’s Scorpio.”

MJ is looking right at him. Her face is softer than he’s ever seen it. 

“What’s the story there?”

“You want the honest truth?”

“Always.”

“It’s just some lame monster that Orion killed,” he says. “But that’s just one version. There’s always room for a different interpretation.”

MJ leans back. 

“What’s yours?”

“Don’t think it matters,” Peter replies. “You write your own story, you know?”

And privately, in a deep dark and horrible place inside of her, MJ realise that she is going to marry this boy: this stupid boy who dragged her across the Nevada desert to look for alien artifacts when he’s already been to space, who has never made her feel more whole and real in her entire life, who looks at her like she’s air and everything else is just treading, just drowning. 

She’s going to marry him, but that won’t be the end of her story. 

“You gonna eat the rest of your burger?”

MJ shoves him. “ _Yeah,_ I’m eating the rest of my burger, asshole.”

“Hey, I was just _asking._ ”

She rolls her eyes and pops a fry into her mouth. They eat in silence for a few minutes. It occurs to Peter that he’s never been in a place so still and quiet. There’s nothing to watch, nothing to see but what’s right in front of him. The desert stretches out into oblivion, the horizon a pitch black blur against jagged mountains that jut from the ground like harshly cut obsidian. 

“You know what, though?” 

“What?”

“I’m really digging the trench coat.”

MJ snorts a laugh. “You’re an idiot.”

“No, I’m serious.” He stands up. “I really feel dignified. I feel like a real secret agent, you know? I never knew I needed this until today.”

“So you’re keeping it?”

“Oh, hell yeah. You should keep yours, too. We can go as Scully and Mulder for Halloween.” 

Her face lights up. “I don’t think I’ve ever loved you more than I do right now.”

Peter, ridiculously, feels his face heat up. To offset it he says, “You love me? That’s so embarrassing, MJ, oh my god.”

“We’ve literally been dating for almost three years.”

“ _Still.”_

She kicks his shoe. When he meets her eyes, they’ve lost all of their edge. It’s incredibly rare that all of her walls come down like this. He doesn’t think he’s ever seen her so at ease, sitting under the yellow light of the motel sign, no tension in her shoulders, bangs pinned back. 

“Hey.”

“Yeah?”

“This was like, the coolest night of my entire life. Thanks for calling me.”

Peter shrugs. Tries not to smile. “It’s whatever, don’t worry about it.”

MJ stands. “I mean it, dork.”

“Yeah, well,” he wraps his arms around her, and then pulls back to spin her. Nothing else comes of whatever it was he was gonna say because they kiss instead, easy with the edges of forever closing in.

He pulls back. Puts one hand on her waist and raises the other. 

“You wanna dance?”

“No time like the present.”

“There’s no music.”

Peter shrugs. “We’ll make our own.”

He can tell she thinks it’s dorky, but they never did really dance at their senior prom. Instead they’d sat on the bleachers and judged everyone’s outfits and then ditched to catch a movie. 

Now they dance and it’s slow, and he hears Ben’s favorite Patsy Cline song in the back of his head, and she smells like lavender. 

And he loves her. 

* * *

“Hey, Mongoose.”

It’s eight in the morning when he returns to the compound and he’s tired to the bone. Morgan is rubbing her eyes sleepily, dragging her blanket behind her and clutching a stuffed Elmo to her chest. 

Peter scoops her up and kisses her cheek which earns him a startled squawk. He then deposits her onto the countertop. 

“Hungry,” she reports. 

“Yeah? What are you feeling? Cocoa puffs?”

Her nose wrinkles. “Those get soggy too fast.”

“You’re absolutely right. What about Cheerios?”

“ _Ick.”_

“Wow, what am I thinking? They are _so_ ick. What if I did something super crazy and—”

“Pancakes?!”

He grins. “Even better.”

“Pancakes with _blueberries?”_

“Bingo.”

Morgan squeaks. “I love you I love you _I love you!”_

“Well if that isn’t my favourite sound in the whole world,” comes a new voice, and then Pepper’s there—dressed in a three-piece suit, hair pinned back, but too stressed to really seem put together. 

It’s unusual and slightly concerning, so he asks, “What’s up? Busy day ahead?”

“God, tell me about it.” She slams her bag onto the table to look through it. “I have about fifty meetings ahead of me with government officials who want to revoke every share we have in—get this— _Area 51._ Apparently it was infiltrated last night but no one has actually told me how serious the situation is or _who_ it was that snuck in. Thank _God_ there were no casualties or I’d be up to my neck in lawsuits. God, _where_ are my keys?! Have you seen my—why do you look like you just swallowed a lemon?”

Peter raises his eyebrows, taking an exaggeratedly long drink of coffee. “What?” 

“ _Peter.”_

He swallows thickly. “Yeah? Hmm?” 

“You didn’t.”

“I’m sorry?”

“You _didn’t.”_

“Didn’t, uh,” he clears his throat. “Didn’t what?”

“ _Peter!_ Oh my _god!”_

  
  


* * *

.

.

.

“You look tired, soldier.”

Steve doesn’t look up from the bar—a chipped cedar thing with thinning lacquer that’s probably as old as him. He comes here often enough to know every dent, scratch, and carving in its surface. He knows the breathing patterns and standing heart rates of all the regulars. He also knows that with every fifth beat, Natasha’s pulse does a hop skip before levelling out again. 

She smells like lemon seed oil. It’s either a huge coincidence or a disturbingly intentional mind-fucking tactic that she wears the same scent as his late mother, Sarah. 

Steve has always tried not to think about it too hard. 

Nat sits down on a stool beside him. She orders a scotch on the rocks, but then Steve says, “Just bring the bottle, Reg.”

Nat raises an eyebrow. “Are we celebrating?”

A flat, tasteless joke. But then, Natasha was never one for tact when she was doing her best to get under the skin. She wants to rile him up tonight, get his blood pumping a little. He figures he’ll know why soon enough, so all he offers in reply is a shrug. 

She wasn’t wrong; he’s tried. He’d spent his morning over in Harlem doing repairs on a run-down complex where a bunch of kids were squatting. 

Then he’d taken the train back over to Brooklyn and sat with the group for a while: that had been draining, as it always is. The flickering fluorescent lights of the church, the miserable green tint created when that half-light bounced off of the faded grey walls; Amanda with her dead husband and brand new boyfriend, Larry with his moral debate over whether or not it’s wrong to be glad his mother was snapped because now she’s not suffering anymore and he no longer has to pay her medical bills, and Steve—Steve, sitting there in that hard folding chair, listening to them all, thinking _this is what Sam would do, I’m doing this for Sam._

All the while, he wonders, _what am I doing for me?_

“Steve.”

Nat’s hand is small but warm against the roughness of his beard. It’s grown back out, reddish and slightly unkept, just like his hair. 

She strokes his cheekbone. 

He winces. 

“Fight?”

“It was nothing.”

“Yeah?” She gives it a little press that gets him flinching away: _rude._ “Had to have been something for anyone to get the drop on Captain America, and we both know that.”

Steve does not want to talk about it. He does not want to talk about _anything._ He has had his fair share of talking for the day, for the year, for the century. All he wants to do is finish his drink and then go back to his tiny, dusty little apartment. Feed his dog, smoke a cigarette just for the smell of it, and then fall asleep. 

Nat tops off his drink. 

That means he’s not going home any time soon. 

He will have to text Carla, his next door neighbor, and ask her to check on Mattie for him. 

“You’ve already got my attention, you know,” he tells her, after a long sip that burns as it goes down. “Don’t need to butter me up.” 

“I’m feeling extra slippery today.”

He snorts a little. Her mouth quirks up. It’s an endearing trait, the first tick he’d ever noticed about her that’d warmed her to him. It reminds him of their days on the run together when they’d play rummy on that little low table in the Phoenix safe house, both sweltering and sweaty, trading curses and wisecracks; and Sam in the kitchen making homemade ice cream, and Bucky—Bucky—

“I just mean it’s… it’s enough just to see you. You’ve got me. What do you need?”

Nat goes still. It occurs to him that it _never_ occurred to her that his first assumption in the event of an impromptu visit from her is always that she needs his help, not that she simply wants to see him. If she wants _that,_ she’ll call, or she’ll text. Once she’d even rung the apartment and he’s still trying to figure out how the hell she got the number for the landline. It was the first and only time the little rotary phone on the wall had broken its silence. 

Like to make up for this, Nat reaches out again. Gently, carefully, she pushes away the strands of hair that are falling into his eyes. 

“You need a better barber.”

“I need a barber, period.”

“I could clean you up.”

“ _Natasha.”_

She sighs. Stares down at her drink like it’ll give her answers he can’t. 

“There’s a situation in Atlantic City.”

“What kind of a situation?”

“Big group, tight knit, working out of a casino. Well, several casinos. They rose through the ranks dealing drugs, but lately they’ve been slipping something else under the table.”

“Something else?”

“It’s a highly specialised serum—not quite as powerful as yours. Makes the user stronger and faster, but only for a temporary amount of time. It’s also killed a few people, but those that survive the experience keep coming back for more. Guess I can see the appeal, I mean, who wouldn’t wanna be you for a little while?”

“Me,” he says, without thinking. 

Nat tops off his glass again. 

“These people are doing dangerous things. They’re blowing up buildings, breaking necks, wreaking a lot of havoc.”

“Sounds like someone should put a cap on it.”

“Yeah,” she smirks. “It’s why I’m sitting with my favourite one.”

That, unlike so many things—modern sitcoms, the stand up comedy shows that perform here every Friday night—gets him to laugh.

Encouraged, she gives his leg a little kick. “Come on, I can tell you’re bored and lonely. Come have some fun with me.”

And it’s true. He’s bored. He’s lonely, and it’s not the kind of lonely that can be solved with Karen from accounting or Sharon from across the hall or a visit to the Sundown Nursing Home; it’s the kind you can’t just put a band-aid on, because the wound goes so deep it just bleeds through. All day long he’s bleeding, he’s lightheaded with loss, with grief. 

He’s half dead on his feet. The other half is ash, is dust. Is _Bucky._

Still… there’s the support group. There’s his dog. There’s the arrangements he made with the soup kitchen on eleventh avenue. 

“What about Parker?”

It’s like a door slamming shut in his face: Nat closes herself off, face shuttered, body locked. “Busy.”

“He’s doing solo missions now?”

“No,” she rolls her neck. “College. Can’t keep dragging him away every time I find something I need a hand with.”

Steve nods. 

“Well,” he says, “you’ve got both of mine. Just tell me what to do with ’em.”

Nat smiles, soft, grateful. She touches her glass to his. “And that’s why you’re the only fella I’ve ever let force me into watching five hours of shitty daytime TV.”

  
  



	3. MISSION: ATLANTIC CITY

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There’s blood.
> 
> There’s _so much_ blood. 
> 
> It’s been—it’s been a long time since Peter’s been standing over a body with this much—this much blood everywhere. His hands are shaking because it’s cold—she’s cold; it’s raining—no, _no,_ they’re inside—the rain was Ben—
> 
> “Queens,” Rogers says, urgent. “Can you help her?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello my beautiful baby beans!! im sorry this one took a lil while to get out, but i hope? it’s okay?

“Can I ask you something?”

Steve, body stiff from sitting in the driver’s seat for so long, says “Shoot,” because at this point he’ll welcome any distraction just to keep from falling asleep.

“Did you love him?”

He glances over. Sees her: one leg propped up on the dash, one arm around her waist with her hand coming to rest right by the scar he’s seen only once. _Bye bye bikinis_ , she’d said, pinned against the wall and pushing back against his weight. He wonders if she even realizes she’s touching the spot; wonders, if he’s honest, how would she take it?

If he tells her he loves the man who once tried to kill her, does it count as a betrayal even when that man is dead?

Probably. Steve still loves him anyway, so yeah. Probably.

“Too personal?”

“Just unexpected,” he replies, swiftly correcting their trajectory so they don’t end up in a ditch.

Natasha hums. He’s never seen her face like this: open and sad, like the pain is all for him, like she’s presenting it to him as some kind of offering.

“Did you?”

Instead of answering he asks, “What gave you that idea?”

“Little birdie might’ve suggested it,” Nat says, “So it’s true?”

Steve’s hands tighten marginally around the wheel, just enough for his knuckles to whiten. Behind them, a car slides into the other lane to bypass their slow speed. He clears his throat and wonders if it’s too late to just open the door and roll right out. What are the odds he’d survive that? Probably about ninety percent depending on the speed of traffic. If they’re going sixty-five but that semi is going fifty—

“Steve.”

“Yeah.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

“Yeah,” he says again. “I just did.”

He doesn’t think there has ever been a thicker silence between them. It’s a palpable thing, charged with electric tension. Him, with a rigid spine and stiff joints and cold blood. Her, with her blue eyes all wide and her mouth parted just enough to let him know that even if she’d suspected it, thought about it a whole lot, she never would have actually _assumed_.

“Is it so surprising?”

“I—” Nat blinks. “I mean I could say no, but I think we both know that’d be bullshit.”

“Yeah, well,” he lets his eyes slide to the left as a mustang races past with their brights on. “Not really something I was ever eager to talk much about. Especially… well, I guess it doesn’t really matter in terms of before and after.”

“What about Peggy?”

“I loved her.”

“But you loved Barnes too?”

And he’s never really heard it. He’s thought it just a few times: when he was sixteen and Bucky was leaning over the guardrail of the Brooklyn Bridge with his cheeks all red from the cold and the biggest, stupidest smile on his face, Steve had thought _I love you_ , and he’d thought, _I always wanna see you happy like this_ ; when he was twenty-four and Bucky was shipped out and he’d thought, _I love you_ , and, _come back to me_ ; once, in London, they were both drunk and fumbling in the dark—it had been the first time, the only time, and Steve can barely remember it (he wonders if there had even been fragments left for Bucky, those sparse slices of the night air competing against the heat of their bodies, hands everywhere, hot, flush, wet)— _I love you_ , he’d thought, and, _I love you,_ and _I love you_ (maybe he’d said it too, _maybe_ ); and lastly, Bucky straddling his body, the Potomac thousands of feet below, the wind in his ears, _I’m with you ’til the end of the line_ —as in, go ahead and kill me, if I’m gonna die it might as well be with you, because of you; as in, _I love you_. 

“Steve.”

“What?”

“You missed the exit.”

* * *

Later they’re taking stock of ammunitions in the hotel room. Well, Steve is. Nat is hunkered over the counter in the kitchenette, staring at him as she slowly works through a box of Lucky Charms. 

“It’s getting a little weird now, Romanoff.”

“You’re gay.” She swallows roughly and before he can even correct her, “Bi? You loved Carter. I didn’t get that wrong. I just didn’t… I forgot the fucking footnotes. Rookie mistake. You get paired up with someone as big and strong and obvious as Steven Grant Rogers and you get too comfortable. Guess I sort of forgot that every story’s got lines to read between.”

Steve sighs. He takes a 22-magnum, drops it onto the countertop, and sits opposite her. Mechanically and methodically he starts to clean the gun. 

“The thing about this—why it’s such a surprise to you—it’s all because you took one look at me and pegged me for an open book. I don’t think you ever figured that’s what I _wanted_ you to peg me for.”

Nat stiffens. Lip between her teeth, spoon dangling from her fingertips. Is she afraid? He can’t tell. 

“So what are you saying?” she asks slowly. “You’re trying to tell me I don’t know you?”

“I’m trying to tell you that you don’t know _all_ of me,” he corrects gently, because he can tell this is unnerving her—this conversation, the hidden meanings behind their words. She is a spy; he is a soldier; they both know how to play the other. 

“Okay.” She nods. “Okay, so tell me: what don’t I know?”

“We fucked once back in ’45.”

And whatever the hell she’d been expecting, it had _not_ been that. Nat chokes on marshmallow, coughs, and Steve actually laughs because the sight is so ridiculous he forgets to be nervous. 

“You— _what?_ ”

It’s not the best place to start, but where is? He and Bucky had always been a mess. There had been no order to the way that they loved each other, no sense. They met in the chaos of a schoolyard fight, grew up in the beating heart of Brooklyn, and died for each other during the turmoil of war. Bloodsoaked bones, bruised hearts, resurrected just to fight again, to keep dying over and over. Eventually Steve would fight just to keep breathing, and wasn’t that a neat full circle?

He came into this world a five-pound asthmatic and now, even after the serum, he cannot draw full breaths when he thinks about Bucky. 

It’s like being stabbed.

It hurts too much. 

“I thought you were a virgin.”

Steve laughs harder. “You thought I was—? That’s... Really?”

“Well, I mean, who—not to burst your bubble, Cap, but I’ve seen the pictures. You didn’t exactly look like you had the ladies lining up at your front door.”

Steve shrugs. “Nah, but Bucky did, and most dames’d do just about anything to get on his good side.”

“Including you?”

“Once or twice. Didn’t mean much, wasn’t ever any good either.”

Nat raises an eyebrow. “But Barnes?”

Steve does not know if it means much when he says, “Best I ever had,” but it should. It’s true. 

She leans back and regards him with a kind of vulnerable, child-like curiosity. 

“You would have let him kill you, huh? D.C.? The helicarriers?”

“Why not? He’d killed me once before.”

That really throws her. He thinks she hadn’t quite gauged that when he says love, he means _that_ kind of love: where if they die, you die too. 

Suddenly she leans forward. 

“You dead right now?”

Honestly, he doesn’t know. 

“Sorta feels like it sometimes. Like I’m asleep. Like half of my brain just wants to lie around and wallow about him and the other half just wants to...” 

A heartbeat. 

“You blame yourself.”

“Of course I do,” Steve whispers. “Of _course_.”

* * *

It happens like this:

Everything is quiet for a stretched out eternity. The air is thin. His lungs hurt, his ribs ache; they are broken, a medic will assess later—four on each side, and though they’ll heal up good in about three days a phantom pain will still linger there for a long time. He will be rock-ribbed for months. 

Quiet. Then, 

“Steve?”

And Steve turns just in time to see him start to crumble. He sees him fall, scattered into a million molecular pieces, ripped apart, reduced to atoms, ashes. 

Gone.

First his knees buckle, and then his eyes widen with a young, primal kind of fear. The moment he realises _this is it, I’m going to die_ is the last expression imprinted on his face. 

Steve reaches out, too late, too slow; he was always too slow when it came to reaching for Bucky, always missing the catch. 

His ears begin to ring. Time is warped. 

Then Steve wakes up.

* * *

Bucky would have said she looked like a _yenta_ all dolled up like that: her hair frizzed and permed, dressed in tight leggings and an animal print jacket, cheap golden hoops dangling from her ears. She raises an eyebrow at him and smacks her gum. 

“If you’re fishing for compliments…”

“You could at least compliment my integrity,” she says. “I feel like I just walked straight out of 1985.”

“Wouldn’t know much about that.”

“Please.” She blows a bubble. Pops it. “You’ve seen movies.”

He has, but not many. They’re just not something he ever had much time for, or made time for anyway. Steve has never really thought of a flick as a casual thing where you sit on your living room couch with a bowl of popcorn and your dog; movies were a night out, him and Buck and maybe a girl or two, their shined shoes reflecting the lights of the marquee. Steve would deliberately choose a seat in the middle of the house where everyone was most visible, and it was always a little bit of a riot to watch his date’s shoulders fall. She’d send a longing look toward Bucky as he climbed the rows with another girl, toward the highest and darkest seats. 

Steve shakes his head to clear it. He tosses her a pack of cigarettes.

Both of her eyebrows go up this time. “You buy these with your own money?”

He had about a week ago. “I’m trying to quit.”

“You _smoke_ them?”

Steve gives her a look. “No, I stole them half used off a bum.” 

“Jesus.” Nat shakes her head in wonderment. “Fuck.”

He says nothing to that. Nat gingerly fingers a cigarette out of the pack. “Got a light, soldier?” 

* * *

They are shadows: still, dark silhouettes against pitch black. The fire was put out hours ago. Steve should be cold. 

But he’s not. 

He’s got Bucky tucked against his side, roughed up and ragged from his time in the prison but impossibly, _perfectly_ warm. Steve can remember that first night after Bucky was shipped out: he’d tossed and turned for hours, alternating between closing the window or sticking one leg out of his blankets. He couldn’t quite get comfortable. The temperature wasn’t right. 

He’d been so used to the way Bucky felt right next to him that he hadn’t been able to fall asleep. 

After a while he’d gotten used to it—not sleeping, that is: travelling the country as Captain America meant spending night after night in trains, on planes, or stashed in an unfamiliar hotel room in an unfamiliar city. It meant staring at ceilings and walls, it meant watching the world slip past; dreamless, restless hours. 

On those nights, Steve would open the windows. He would lean out and let the chill wrap around his reformed body—for once not having to worry about catching a cold—and he would light a cigarette. The smell would cling to his clothes come morning, and once or twice he knows Peggy had noticed. She’d never asked, though, and he’d been grateful. How could he possibly explain that he only did it to have a little piece of Bucky with him while he sat with one knee braced against the window frame, his too-big hands relearning their way around a sketchbook, shading the outlines of buildings with their brownstone faces and flickering candescent eyes? 

Now that Steve thinks about it, he’s not sure he’s actually slept a whole night through since the serum. 

He’s not sleeping now. The ridges of the trunk he’s leaning against dig into his back. He scans the tree line about three clicks away from their makeshift camp; he is a deer at attention, ears perked, waiting to make use of the rifle between his knees. 

Bucky shifts a little. He can tell just how tired he is when his arm comes to wrap around Steve’s waist. His face turns into the crook of Steve’s neck, scratchy with stubble. 

It’s dark. The others are asleep. Bucky’s had… a long few weeks. And it shouldn’t matter anyway; they’re brothers.

So Steve allows it. 

Bucky sighs through his nose. He mutters, “אתה גדול מדי בשבילי לעטוף את הזרועות מסביב עכשי.”

“So you’re _not_ asleep.”

Steve can feel him start to smile. He also feels it when Bucky’s arms tighten around his waist—but like he said, Steve’s bigger, and out of habit Bucky’d tried to hold him. 

It shouldn’t make him feel like this: he shouldn’t be getting lightheaded at the gentle brush of Bucky’s lips against his pulse. They are _brothers_. Comrades in arms. 

But no one is looking. 

And Bucky is tired. 

He’d spent weeks in a damp cell, he’d been strapped down to a table; he was muttering his own ID tag over and over when Steve had found him and when he’d seen him, he’d said _Steve_ like the word was light, and… 

Steve turns his head away from the tree line. He wraps an arm around Bucky and corals him closer; they could be brothers like this, or something else—the kind of something else that charges Steve’s nerves and gets his heart palpitating. 

“It’s like lyin’ against a boulder.”

“Shut up, punk,” Steve retorts. 

Bucky snorts against the leather of Steve’s jacket collar. Then he leans back, eyes narrowed to spy Steve in the dark. His hands—hot, grimy, but that’s nothing new; his hands had always been dirty from working on the docks and in the garage—feel up and down Steve’s sides until he produces the pack of Strikes he’d been searching for. 

He mouths one. 

“Got a light, soldier?”

Steve’s lip quirks up at the corner. As it so happens, he does. 

The end of Buck’s cigarette glows orange as he sucks in a long, desperate drag, like to taste nicotine is to indulge in the food of the gods. 

Steve wonders, fleetingly, terrifyingly, if that’s what it would be like to taste _him_. 

“So what’s keeping you up?” Buck asks. Of the two of them, he is the one most afraid of silence. He grew up in a house with four sisters and, until he was sixteen, two very loud grandparents. The only time he’s not running his mouth is when he’s asleep or when he’s so goddamn angry his jaw locks shut. 

Steve shrugs. “I don’t really sleep much these days.”

“So they turned you into a vampire too, huh?”

“Funny.” Steve digs the heel of his boot into the dirt. “I don’t know. I’ve gone up to two weeks without any before, but then I crashed for three days straight. Missed two shows.”

Bucky stills. “Shows?”

“Oh, that’s right, you don’t know about that—” he finds himself grinning because looking back on it, the whole thing had been pretty damn ridiculous. “I’m sort of a celebrity now. They call me Captain America. We went on this whole tour to sell war bonds and—Christ, Buck, there are even comics about me.” 

Bucky is staring, open mouthed, eyes wide like a little kid’s.

Then he starts to laugh.

It’s loud, and Steve hates to stifle it even if they _are_ in enemy territory and surrounded by exhausted soldiers. It’s his favorite sound, as corny as that is, and he’d forgotten how much he loved the way Bucky’s head fell back and his eyes crinkled shut. 

“Oh, fuck, Stevie, I’m sorry. It’s just—it’s—”

“Fuckin’ stupid?”

“Yeah, that.” He grins. “ _Comics?_ Are you serious?”

“Movies, too.”

Bucky’s whole face lights up. “Are you in them? _Please_ tell me you’re in them.”

“Oh, I’m in them.”

Buck shakes his head in wonderment. Steve raises an eyebrow. “What, you don’t believe me?”

“Well I mean,” Bucky can’t help grinning again, “I’m still having a little trouble believing you’re you.”

Steve nods. He can understand that. 

Still, just to prove it, he grabs the prop shield where the war bonds speech is still taped and Bucky uses the flame of the lighter to read it. “ _Not all of us can storm a beach or drive a tank, but there’s still a way all of us can fight. Series-E defense bonds; each one you buy is a bullet in the barrel of your best guy’s gun. We all know this is about trying to win the war, but we can’t do that without bullets and bandages, tanks and tents. That’s where you come in, every bond you buy will help protect someone you love, keep our boys armed and ready, and the Germans will think twice about trying to get the drop on us. So how many of you are ready to help me sock old Adolf on the jaw?_ —you’re shittin’ me. What the _fuck_.”

“I know.”

“They made you go around in _that_ and say all this?!” He giggles with pure delight. “I’d pay to see that shit.”

“You wouldn’t be the first,” Steve points out. 

Bucky flicks ash off the end of his cigarette. He reads over the words again, still smiling faintly, mouthing his favourite lines. “Dumb,” he concludes. “Bet you looked real stupid.”

“Felt real stupid too,” Steve agrees.

Buck leans back on his haunches. He breathes out smoke and regards Steve. “Suit looks okay, though, the more I think about it.”

And it’s so fucking typical that Steve’s cheeks flush. Jesus, what the hell is the matter with him? Thank God it’s dark. 

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Like it on you.”

And well—that’s something, isn’t it?

* * *

“Steve?”

He starts a little. Blinks down at the small hand gripping forearm. Pale, black painted nails, scarred in a few places. 

Nat stares. “You good?”

“I—yeah.”

He feels for his lighter.

* * *

Arthur McCarthey is having a good night.

He’s up six grand and he’s only been playing for two hours. Nat’s kept track of every move he makes; she notes every subtle flick of his wrist, every raise of his eyebrow, the occasional clearing of his throat. 

He’s counting cards.

That’s fine. It’s not what she’s here to bust him for, anyway. 

Nat would love to be sitting at the table opposite him. She’d love to give him a literal run for his money. 

Instead she’s perched at a slot machine, Steve’s cigarette dangling from her lips. The contrast of cherry lip balm and tobacco is slightly disgusting but hey, whatever, she’s got a job to do.

And isn’t that how it always goes? Like slipping into another skin, she dons the face and habits and flaws of someone completely made up—sometimes she even has fun with it, takes pieces of real people. 

Like the way she’s decided to mutter “ _Vot eto pizdets,_ ” under her breath whenever she loses. That’s totally a Petrov thing. 

But the rest—too much blush, cakey eyeshadow, chipped red nails and a laugh that could break glass—that’s all the false persona of Anastasia Smirnov. She wears Nat’s smile and has Nat’s eyes and sounds like Natasha Romanov; Natalia Alianovna; but she is neither, none.

Normally Nat doesn’t give too much thought to pretending to be someone else. It’s like putting on a different outfit at this point.

But sitting here with nothing else to do except slip change into a slot and pull a lever, eyes locked on the lanky man in the Italian suit fifteen feet away—well, sometimes the existentialism creeps up on you.

“Status?”

“Up a grand,” Nat reports quietly, yanking the lever so that the grating jingle of the machine covers her words. “How are you doing?”

“She went to the bathroom.”

“Oh?” Nat’s lip tugs up accidentally. “If she comes back with fresh lipstick on, you’re in.”

“What if the safe isn’t in her room?”

“Then I guess you’ll just have to sleep with her, Rogers.”

Steve makes a displeased sound. Nat sucks in smoke. Arthur’s eyes catch hers. He looks away quickly. 

Another pull of the lever.

“I’m in the same boat as you, you know.”

“I never liked this sort of thing,” Steve says. “It feels dishonest.”

“There’s no room for honesty in the game,” Nat reminds him; reminds herself. 

Because yes, sometimes even she forgets. Sometimes even her spine wants to stand as ramrod straight as Steve’s. Sometimes she wonders if it’s all the lies weighing her down or if it’s the grief; if she would even have the grief were it not for the lies.

Then something grabs at her. “What do you mean, never? Have you had a one night stand before?”

“Could you stop asking me about my sex life for two minutes? Please?”

“Oh come on,” Nat exhales smoke and decides it’s time for another heady look at her target. He is already staring, but looks away again all skittish like. It’d be cute if it weren’t infuriating. “You’ve got to admit that you’d be just as intrigued if you were in my shoes.”

And really, what a revelation that had been—Steve Rogers the Bisexual.

Steve grunts and mutters something about Michelle “Call Me Shelly” McCarthey being enroute. Nat grins and covers it by blowing a bubble with her stale gum. 

She tries to picture him and Barnes—not even sexually, because that’s just… a whole other thing. No, just—domestically. It’s too strange to wrap her head around.

She knows a lot about Barnes. Well, she knows the basics. The Winter Soldier is another story. _Him_ she knows like the back of her hand. She knows what his eyes are saying when they are hard, and what it means when his back stiffens at attention, and she knows—above all else, the thing that stuck with her the most—that when he gets sad, his voice takes on a lilting Cagney accent, and sometimes he sings in Hebrew to the littlest recruits. 

And then he dies and comes back two days later with a stone face and stone arms that they make work of loosening up again; they tug at him, climb all over his brickwork body like a jungle gym. The smiles re-emerge and the sad eyes, and the quiet words of encouragement—whispered, rough Russian. 

That man. _Him_. 

And Steve.

All along those eyes had been sad for _Steve_. 

“Heading to the sixteenth floor,” Steve reports.

“Congratulations,” Nat replies. 

* * *

Nat eyes the amber liquid as it pours smoothly into her glass. It’s a pretty thing, the sort of thing Anastasia Smirnov could look at for hours and never get tired of; clean cuts of crystal, glinting in with low flickering light of Arthur McCarthey’s hotel room fireplace. 

She looks up at him. Smiles real sweet. 

“Is it very old?”

He smiles back. Puts his finger under her chin like he means to shuck it, like she’s a little kid or something. “Older than you. And me, probably.”

“So very,” she concludes happily, and drinks. 

Makes a face, because Anastasia Smirnov does not do heavy alcohol. 

He really does shuck her chin, then. “Don’t drink it all at once,” he says, moving to sit beside her on the bed. “It’s quality stuff. You’ve got to savor it, kitten.”

_Kitten_. Natalia wants to vomit, she really does. What kind of asshole calls a girl he just met _kitten?_ She hides her disgust with a damn good smile and then, in two swift moves, sets her glass down and moves to straddle his waist.

This is the tricky part. 

He looks pleased about the change. Stares up at her in bland amusement as if she really is just a stupid kitten on his lap; he wants to see what she’s going to do next, if she’s worth the trouble. 

Nat runs a finger down the bridge of his nose. Good skin. At least he has that going for him. 

“You are very rich man?”

“Very,” he agrees. “I could buy you anything you wanted, Ana. What do you want?”

“You could buy me castle somewhere?”

That’s what Anastasia Smirnov would want, isn’t it? She has little to no imagination. When she thinks of money, she thinks of it like a fairy tale. It is so outlandish a concept to be wealthy; those men and women in their fancy clothes are mixed in with royalty, with gods and myths. 

But Arthur smiles. “I could.”

Nat strokes his jaw. This part of him is weaker, less defined. “What about… puppy?”

Arthur snorts. “Always a puppy.”

“Hmm?”

“Nothing. I’ll buy you a puppy, Ana. What will you name him?” 

Natalia thinks. “Popper.”

She had a dog named Popper once. Stupidly, right then she misses that yapping white ball of fluff, and she frowns.

“You look sad,” he observes, all simpering. God, is this how it normally goes for him? Does he always push their sticky sprayed hair from their faces and smudge their eyeliner when he wipes their fresh tears? Does he always kiss both of their cheeks, lips warm but dry, and then lean back to see if they liked it?

“I miss someone,” Natalia says, and it’s not a lie. It’s the first honest thing she’s said all night. “A lot of someones actually.”

“Did you lose them? After the Snap?”

“I did.”

Finally, a way in.

“Did you lose anyone?”

He nods. They are still playing the game where they start to cry, so they can excuse the sex they’ll have as based in sadness, in shared grief. “My father. He was there one second and then… well, you know how it goes. I inherited his assets as a result and now here we are.”

“In the top floor of your casino,” she adds on. “You are lucky man.”

“Maybe,” he says. “But it’s hard to see it that way when it comes from loss.”

He blinks suddenly, as if he hadn’t expected himself to tell such a truth. Nat has that sort of effect on men. 

Then, just to cover it all up nice and neat, he asks, “Is there anything else you want?”

This is the part where they kiss. 

But Nat doesn’t roll that way. She lets her lips get real close, just close enough to really feel the heat of him, for them to brush against one another—

—and then she punches him in the groin, the throat; pushes him back onto the mattress and looms over him holding the gun that had been hidden in the waistband of her skirt. Its barrel is trained toward him. He chokes, blinking dazedly. 

“You wanna know what I want?”

She cocks the gun.

“I want the name of your goddamn supplier, you son of a bitch.” 

“I—” a sharp, rasping breath, “I don’t—”

“Your _supplier!_ ” She presses, because urgency, anger, almost always works. If he believes her to be deranged he will give her what she needs to get her to leave quicker. “Give me names, _now!_ ”

“Supplier… for… what—”

Nat knees his groin again. His eyes widen and he hisses in agony. “ _Fuck!_ ”

“Don’t play dumb, asshole,” she snaps. “I know who you are. I know about the serum you’ve been pushing. What, surprised? Thought it wouldn’t catch up to you? Guess we all do, huh? Maybe next time don’t sell to such mouthy clients.”

Arthur shakes his head. “You’re fucking crazy.”

“You’re damn right.”

“I’m not gonna tell you shit.”

Oh, this just got fun. 

Nat raises an eyebrow. “You’re not? What a shame. Guess that means we’ll have to do this the hard way—”

Just then the door to Natasha’s right flies open and Steve bursts in with it: his hair is a mess and his eyes are wide. “I got it.”

Nat squints down at Arthur. “You have an adjoining room with your sister? That’s a little weird even by my book.”

Arthur looks between them both. “I—WHAT?”

“The supplier,” Steve says, out of breath, “you can get off of him now.”

“Where?” Nat asks, still sitting on McCarthey.

“New York.”

“You’re _shitting_ me.”

“Wish I was.”

She sighs. Lowers the gun. “Well, this could have been a lot of fun. Unfortunately we’ve gotta jet. Sweet dreams, McCarthey.”

Nat pricks his neck with one of the circular devices Danvers had sent from some place called Morag. Apparently, enough of this stuff and Arthur will be out like a light for a whole forty-eight hours.

“You did her?”

Steve nods. “She’s passed out on the couch.”

“No,” Nat says, climbing off the bed. “I meant did you _do_ her?”

Steve scowls. “You know what, Romanoff—”

She laughs.

* * *

Their base of operations is a long, low warehouse in Little Odessa. It’s exactly where Shelly McCarthey had told Steve to find it: closed off with a meagre layer of barbwire fence, not too far from the water so that Steve can still smell the ocean as he and Nat approach. 

“Take rear,” he commands. “We’ll meet in the middle.”

Nat nods. She skirts around the east side. Steve takes point, hurrying through the dark, avoiding what little light there is to see by. It’s quiet out here—well, quiet for New York, anyway. It’s the sort of place kids go these days to shoot cans and shoot up, he imagines.

There isn’t much security. Steve’s enhanced hearing picks up the sound of Nat knocking out a couple of guys around where the garage doors are. 

Steve tries the door. 

It’s unlocked.

He slips inside and finds rows of boats—rusted and old, abandoned. Whoever owned this place before these guys took it over must have been Snapped. 

Steve walks through on high alert. He’s not really expecting a fight. They haven’t even noticed anything is off yet; he can hear them, too: muttering under their breaths, moving boxes, packing up to ship orders out. 

There are low hanging lights dangling from the rafters over the most empty part of the warehouse. Steve stands just on the edge of them, not quite visible until—

“Hands up.”

The men stiffen. There are eight of them, standing around tables covered in piles of packaged test tubes that are full of a bright blue liquid. 

“They only speak Russian,” Nat reminds him. Her gun is raised, just like his. She says, “ _Ruki vverkh!_ ” 

They comply. Steve lets her handle them while he goes over to inspect the wares. “Okay,” he says, after a few seconds of thought. “Cuff ’em and we’ll burn the place down.”

Nat is already halfway there—and that’s when it happens, the way these things always do: completely out of nowhere.

A gunshot rings out. 

Natasha hits the floor.

Steve whips around toward the sound and finds the shooter—late forties, fitted suit, shined shoes and close-cropped hair. “I don’t think so, Rogers,” he says, and fires again.

Steve is barely able to get his shield up in time. The bullet rebounds off the surface and takes out the guy to his right, and then the guy to his left finds his courage and charges Steve. 

He uses the shield to knock him out, but the bullets are still flying and one hits his shoulder when he turns. Steve ducks under a table and chances a quick look at Nat. 

Her eyes are open. She’s staring right at him, and there is so much red—

Steve’s ears perk at a faint sucking sound. 

“Oh, _fuck_ ,” he whispers.

Because that’s not good. 

That’s really, _really_ not good at all.

He hasn’t had to go toe to toe with another enhanced soldier since Bucky. But what choice does he have? Nat is dying. He doesn’t have to be a doctor to know that much.

Steve rolls away from cover and charges.

* * *

Peter seriously shouldn’t be in the city.

He has midterms this week. Five midterms to be precise, which doesn’t include the massive amount of studying he also needs to cram in so he can pass the three others he’s taking next week. 

What sane person takes eight college classes in one semester? 

No sane person. But Peter’s pretty much accepted the fact that he’s about as far from it as a person can get. 

And he’d missed Pepper. 

And he has laundry to do. 

And MJ always gets incredibly cranky when she has tests coming up, so he’s decided he’s gonna stop by Columbia on his way back tomorrow and surprise her with a visit, maybe bring her some chocolate or something. 

Only when he gets to the apartment, he finds that Pepper isn’t there. It sucks, but it’s not unusual. He sends her a text and, to his great consternation, she’s in _Beijing_. 

So Peter goes to the Tower. Studying in the lab with the gentle hum of machinery is always preferable to holing himself up in an empty apartment for hours on end. 

He stops and gets himself kimchi. Eats on the way. The lobby of the building is practically empty given the late hour and Peter’s worn out chucks squeak against the polished marble floor. The receptionist glances up at his approach of the elevators, does a double take, blushes, and then looks down again. 

Peter leans against the wall as the elevator climbs upward. 

“Hello, Peter.”

“Hi, FRIDAY.”

“It would appear that your levels of serotonin are significantly lower than they were upon our last encounter,” she reports, much to his chagrin. “Would you like to talk to me about it?”

Peter sighs. “I’m fine,” he promises as he exits onto his floor— _Tony’s_ old floor. 

It’s the same thing he’s been telling everyone for weeks.

It’s also a lie.

He’s not fine. He knows that. He’s well aware that he’s barely been sleeping, barely been eating; he’s aware that he’s been throwing himself into school in order to ensure that he doesn’t have a single moment of free time with which to actually _think_. 

But it’s worked so far. Why stop?

Peter gets settled in the lab. He eats absently while taking notes and occasionally asking FRIDAY questions. They’re in the middle of a rapid-fire back and forth quizzing session when she suddenly blurts, “Steve Rogers is attempting to enter the building through the sublevel five entrance.”

Peter’s spine straightens. “He’s—what? Are you _sure?_ ” 

“You are aware that I have facial recognition programming integrated into my software?” 

Peter ignores that. He’s already moving. “Is he alone?” 

“No. He’s with Natasha Romanoff.” 

He frowns. “She could just use her access code to let him in if she wanted to, couldn’t she?” 

“It would appear that she is currently incapacitated. She is suffering from a severe gunshot wound to her left upper quadrant and has lost a fatal amount of blood.” 

_Fatal_. 

Peter had been walking before, but at that, he runs. “Let them in! Give Rogers full clearance and take him to floor 112! And _call Harley!_ ”

* * *

There’s blood.

There’s _so much_ blood. 

It’s been—it’s been a long time since Peter’s been standing over a body with this much—this much blood _everywhere_. His hands are shaking because it’s cold—she’s cold; it’s raining—no, _no_ , they’re inside—the rain was Ben—

“Queens,” Rogers says, urgent. “Can you help her?”

Peter snaps out of it. Blinks. Shakes his head to clear it and then sucks in a sharp breath.

“FRIDAY, give me a rundown.”

“Agent Romanoff is suffering from a haemopneumothorax. She has lost a total of three liters of blood and is in critical condition. There is damage to her mediastinum, her left and right lung walls, and the lower left ventricle of her heart.”

Peter listens to all of that while washing his hands. He gloves them. Rounds the counter toward the table where Nat had been dropped by Rogers—his arms had been so slick with blood, she’d just slipped right out of them. 

“Scan for an exit wound.”

“None.”

“ _Fuck_.” He sucks in a sharp breath. “Rogers, there’s a pack of surgical instruments in the cabinet on the right. Bring those to me. When you’re done with that, I need you to go downstairs and—listen to me carefully—there are two fridges: the one on the left has the blood. She’s O-neg. I need as much as you can carry. I need a blood transfusion kit—those are in a basket above the fridge. I need you to do all this, and I need you to run, or she’s gonna die.”

* * *

Peter has taken a total of three med classes. He knows his way around basic human anatomy, but not intimately. Not enough to save someone’s life.

Despite this, he still finds himself wrist deep in Natasha Romanoff’s chest cavity trying to keep her alive. 

Her shirt’s been cut off and thrown… somewhere. The bullet is out. He’d found it lodged beneath her left lung. There’s gauze everywhere and Peter is very aware that—though the MedBay is sterile, the common area isn’t exactly optimal for trauma surgery. 

“Update?” 

“Vitals are worsening.”

“God—fuck. There’s a clot, I can—clamp, Rogers—”

Then Harley bursts through the doors. Harley fucking Keener who’s majoring in biomechanics and could probably preform any kind of surgery at this point if he wanted, just because he reads about this shit all the time for fun. Peter’s pretty sure he’s even practised on cadavers. 

He takes one look at the scene before him and his face turns to stone. “What’ve we got?”

“GSW to the chest—the whole cavity is a mess, she’s losing blood faster than I can replace it—there’s a clot and I can’t—I’m gonna have to use my hands—”

“Peter, wait—”

Peter doesn’t listen. He’s already feeling for it, carefully because he’s not a dumbass. And he can feel it. It’s _huge_. Peter does his best to remove it without doing any damage and—

“Vitals strengthening,” FRIDAY reports, as soon as the disgustingly large blood clot is tossed onto the waste tray. 

“Jesus,” Harley says. “ _Jesus_ , move over.”

He’s not talking to Peter, he’s talking to Rogers. Peter barely registers the two of them switching positions. Then it’s Harley handing him the instruments, Harley telling him what to do.

And then—

“She’s crashing!” FRIDAY reports. 

“Defibrillator!” Harley snaps at Rogers. 

Peter snatches the paddles as soon as they’re within reach. He gels them. “Charge to 200.”

“Charged.”

“ _Clear!_ ”

One shock.

“Anything?!”

“No improvement.”

“Charge to 300.”

“Charged.”

“ _Clear!_ ”

* * *

“Listen, I just—”

“It’s not your fault.”

Steve stops. He stares at Parker— _Peter_ —for a long moment. His eyes flit down to the hourglass tattoo visible on the younger man’s forearm, half obscured by the blood-stained cuffs of his rolled up shirtsleeves. 

Natasha means a lot to him. Probably as much to him as she does to Steve. They’re family. 

So it makes sense, the way he’s standing: like a soldier facing the front for the first time, jaw locked, back rigid and waiting for an ambush. 

But there’s no front; there’s just the operating room that Nat’s been moved to, and Keener standing over her, and the steady beating of monitors. They watch through windows, the way Steve had watched Fury die that day, and he prays to a God he doesn’t believe in that it doesn’t end like that today. He can’t lose anyone else.

But this is all they can do. Stand here. Helpless.

“I just…”

“Stop trying to make me hate you,” Peter snaps, and there’s something about his furious expression that’s so familiar. “I’m not gonna. I refuse.”

“I’m not,” Steve objects. “That’s not… I just wanna say, I wish… I wish it wasn’t like this.”

Peter’s expression morphs into confusion. Hell, even Steve isn’t really sure what he means by that. Does he wish they weren’t standing here right now, watching some teenager operate on their—their sister—or does he mean he wishes it weren’t like _this_ : both of them standing exactly three feet away from the other, hands in their pockets, tense; estranged from the other?

Steve decides he means both ways, because Peter… well, he might not know him well, but he’s a good kid. That’s easy enough to see. 

“It doesn’t have to be,” Peter says softly, almost sorry. “I know it seems like we’re all divided down the middle, and sometimes—sometimes I still get pissed off about the whole thing—but… she loves you. I love her. I won’t ever hate you.”

“Because of her?”

“Because if Natasha Romanoff likes you enough to give you the time of day, you must be good for _something_ ,” he corrects.

Steve almost smiles. 

He clears his throat. “You were good. Under pressure, I mean. You saved her life.”

A shrug. “She’s saved mine a dozen times over.”

Humility. Loyalty. Stupidly, Steve thinks: _Erkstine would’ve liked this kid._

“What?” Peter asks, because Steve is looking at him kind of funny.

“Nothing.” Steve shifts his attention back to Nat. “You just remind me of someone, is all.”

“Yeah? Who?”

“A guy in my old unit. Jim Morita.”

And Peter busts out a laugh, startling with its suddenness. “Sorry,” he says, “God, I just love how you say it, like his grandson wasn’t my principal or something.”

“Wait, what?”

Peter nods. “Jim Morita the Third. I even wrote a paper about his grandfather in one of my history classes.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. And about you.”

“Me?”

“Well,” Peter shifts, suddenly uncomfortable. “You and Barnes.”

“Me and Buck?”

“Yeah. I sort of um… my whole thesis might’ve been that you were a lot… closer than everyone thought.”

Steve stares. Blinks. 

“Jesus Christ.”

* * *

Waking up after almost dying is never a pleasant experience.

Nat’s head throbs. Her teeth ache. She can smell the blood even beneath the heavy scent of antiseptic. 

She tries to move and instantly there are hands on her shoulders pushing her back down. “Don’t do that.”

Nat realises she hasn’t even opened her eyes yet. She cracks them, blinks groggily, and finds Peter frowning down at her. 

“How do you feel?”

“Shitty.”

“I meant on a scale of one to ten.”

Nat grunts. Shifts to assess the edges of her pain. “Six.”

“Liar,” he replies. The blanket moves down. The thin material of the shirt she’s been clothed in moves up—and wow, that looks a lot worse than she’d been expecting. 

“I, uh—”

“You almost died,” he says: short, clipped, final. “Half an inch closer to your heart and you would have. Luckily it just grazed the tissue. Then it pierced your left lung, which filled with blood. You flatlined once and I had to shock you to bring you back, so expect some additional soreness—”

“Woah, woah, slow down—”

“In addition to that, you hit your head pretty hard when you went down, so there’s a concussion to worry about as well—”

“Peter.”

He stops, hands stilling at her sides. They’re warm and feel strange there. 

“You almost died,” he says again, and this time there’s anger behind the words. 

“But I _didn’t_.” 

“Only because I was there to bring you back!”

Nat winces. She scans the room, which is barren aside from basic hospital equipment. “Where’s Steve?”

Peter’s expression darkens even further. “He had to go feed his dog.”

Nat falls back against the pillows. Sitting up hurts too much.

“You’re healing faster than expected.”

She cracks an eye. “Oh?”

“That’s fake surprise.”

Nat sighs. Closes the eye again and thinks for a second on how much to tell him. Finally she settles for: “Graduating from the Black Widow programme involved the implementation of a highly specialised serum.”

“So you’re enhanced?”

“Only a little.” 

She looks again. He is looking right back, and she has never seen him more furious. 

“Peter—”

“You got shot,” he snaps. “Which I understand. Shit happens. But see, what I don’t understand is why you continuously put yourself in situations like this—”

“I’m perfectly capable of handling a minor drug ring—”

“See the thing is, you’re not! Rogers told me he had to take out six guys at once—after they’d shot up with the serum—because you went down right away!”

“It was a lucky shot!” 

“You’re putting yourself in too much danger!”

“That’s _not_ for you to decide!”

“Yeah, fine,” he shakes his head, “but what if I hadn’t been here? What if I’d been in Cambridge?”

“Well,” Nat glares at the ceiling, “I guess I would have been pretty fucked, huh?”

“Guess so.”

Nat redirects the glare at him. “I spent my entire life training to handle situations like this one. There is _nothing_ I do better. One lucky shot doesn’t change the fact that if I could do it over again, I could do it in my _sleep_. It was just… good Friday night fun.”

Peter stares. Blinks. “I can’t believe you sometimes.”

“Peter—”

“No. Seriously. Harley’s gonna take over administration of your medical care. I have to get back to school. Under normal circumstances, I’d stay, but you don’t seem to give much of a fuck what I think.”

“Peter—”

“Bye, Natasha.”

* * *

Steve comes later the next day. By that time Nat is already out of bed and just hesitantly beginning to walk around the MedBay, but she’s nowhere close to healed.

“Hey, soldier.”

“Romanoff,” he returns, but there’s no smile.

So everyone is pissed at her, then.

“What are you doing around these parts?”

“Came to return this,” he says, raising the shield. “And to see a friend.”

Nat frowns. “I stole that for you out of love.”

“And I’m returning it. It’s no big deal. I don’t really plan on…” he sucks in a sharp breath and gently lays it down on a nearby table. “I don’t think I’m exactly cut out for this line of work anymore.”

“Steve—”

“No, really. I’d rather just…”

“What, live your sad little life in that tiny apartment? I’ve seen it, you know. I know that you spend half your week moping around with a group of people talking about your feelings when you could be out there _doing_ something—”

“Natasha,” he cuts in, so sadly, “there’s _nothing_ to do. Don’t you get that by now? It’s over. We lost.”

She can’t hear that. Not from him. It’s one thing to hear Peter say it, but Steve? Steve, the most stubborn son of a bitch she knows, is _giving up._

“What about Barnes?”

She doesn’t expect it, but Steve smiles. It’s flavoured with heartbreak. “I’ll see him again someday. I know that.”

“This is pathetic.”

“It is what it is.”

“You can’t just—I can’t be the only one—”

“Nat, I’m sorry.” He shakes his head. “Listen, I’m not gonna stop coming around the compound. We can keep training every Tuesday just how you like—as soon as you’re better, that is. And if you need me…”

Nat wipes her cheeks, only realising there are tears there when they start to tickle her jaw. 

“Don’t lie to me. I know you only come around to do your laundry.”

Steve’s lip quirks up. “Better than paying a buck fifty per load.”

Then he leans forward and kisses her cheek, all sweet and brotherly, and Nat breathes and reminds herself that she still has something left, that this isn’t over yet, that no matter what Rogers says she won’t stop until she’s dead. 

She will do whatever it takes. 


	4. MISSION: NEW YORK

* * *

Halloween

* * *

“Stay still please, shortcake?”

Morgan harrumphs and fidgets even more in his lap because she’s actually the most stubborn little shit alive. Peter tightens his grip on her as he carefully finishes off her braid. 

“Done?”

“Oh, so you _don’t_ want me to add flowers?”

She grunts. “I just want _candy._ ”

Peter grins and may or may not take an excessive amount of time weaving in the little bellflower sprigs she’d picked. He’s not exactly sure _why_ flowers were essential for a Hermione Granger costume, but he’s not about to question the way Morgan’s imagination works. 

“Okay,” he announces. “ _Bellissima._ ”

“ _Ti ci è voluto abbastanza tempo,_ ” she grumbles, carefully patting the petals to make sure they’re all in place.

Peter gasps. “ _Someone’s_ being a diva tonight.” 

“Yeah, you are,” she puts her hands on her hips. “ _Duh._ ”

Peter snatches her up and she squeals. He proceeds to blow a raspberry against her stomach which _always_ makes her laugh. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she gasps. “Just can we _please_ go now?”

“Yes, we can go. Get your wand and Crookshanks, okay?”

Morgan dutifully runs off to her room to retrieve the wand he’d made her and her little stuffed cat toy. Peter, in turn, ducks into the living area where Pepper is spread out on the floor with her laptop and a bunch of paperwork. 

“Are you _sure_ you can’t come?”

Pepper sighs. “Deadlines.”

“But you’ll be okay here all alone?”

“Well, someone’s gotta hand out candy,” she says. “I didn’t buy a bunch of full size bars for nothing.”

He grins. “I still can’t believe we’re _that_ house. Save some for me, will you?”

“No promises,” she tells him, and then, “have fun!”

* * *

The fun is short lived. 

It’s not because Peter has to stop a robbery or gets stabbed like usual; it’s because Morgan gets tired thirty minutes in. He ends up carrying her from apartment to apartment, letting her down only to walk up to the door while he waits in the background wearing a Hufflepuff robe and a Michael Myers mask (he and Pepper have been pretty successful at keeping Morgan out of the limelight thus far just using cheap tricks like that).

“Trick’r’treat,” Morgan says for probably the fortieth time, weakly holding up the bag that’s progressively getting heavier and heavier. 

She gets her candy. The door closes. She stumbles up to him.

“You want me to hold it?”

Like always, the answer is _no._ Peter rolls with it. He picks her up and lets her pretend this doesn’t mean he’s technically carrying her bag for her. 

“Hey Mongoose?”

“Mmm?” 

“How do you feel about a cheeseburger?”

* * *

Food is fuel and Morgan dives into her burger with such ferocity he has to remind her to chew before she swallows. 

He wipes her face for her. “Good?”

She gives him that happy little kid nod, swinging her legs back and forth at the counter. She plucks up a fry. “Hey Petey?”

“Yeah, kiddo?”

“Is Daddy dead?”

Peter stills. She’s never asked that before. Sure, she’s not even four years old, and she probably doesn’t really understand the full concept of death anyway. He’s never really thought about explaining it all to her because, like, how the _hell_ do you water that down enough so it’s kid-friendly enough to not give nightmares?

“Um… yeah, baby. He is.”

“For my whole life? He’s never met me even once?”

Peter’s heart rents. “No,” he says, roughly. 

“Not even _before_ I was born?”

“I… what do you mean?”

“Well we must have been in the sky at the same time,” she says, like that makes all the sense in the world. “I was in Mommy’s tummy, right? But he was with me before then?”

He literally has no idea how to answer that. She doesn’t even seem to notice his silence, though, and asks: “Can you tell me about him?”

“Yeah,” he chokes out. “Yeah, I can—um—he liked building things. Not bridges or houses, but machines. And he was funny. God, he was so, _so_ funny, but it was mostly sarcastic and—he cared. Like, more than anyone ever realised. So many people thought he was irresponsible and selfish and just—just bad, you know? But he wasn’t. He cared about everyone, he wanted to help every single person that he could.”

“Was he smart?”

“ _Super_ smart.”

Morgan chews on that. “I wish I could remember.”

They’re both quiet for a minute. Then Peter tugs on one of her braids. “Hey, you wanna know something else?”

“What?”

“He would have really, _really_ loved you.”

“You think so?”

“I _know_ so,” Peter counters. “He definitely would’ve liked you a lot better than he liked me.”

Morgan frowns. “Daddy didn’t like you?”

He can’t even look at her. “I don’t know. I think so. No, I know he did. But I just… didn’t deserve that. I let him down.”

Before she can say anything to that, Peter realises he’s basically unloading all of his issues onto his baby sister which is the absolute _last_ thing either of them need right now. Or like, ever. He shakes his head and scoops her up. “Enough being sad. We should go home before Mom flips out, huh?”

Morgan laughs. “But it’s _fun_ when she gets angry.”

“You are the only person on the entire planet who would think that. The _only_ one, I swear to God.”

* * *

MJ’s friends don’t know about Peter.

It’s not because she’s like, ashamed of him or embarrassed to be Spider-Man’s girlfriend. It’s just… weird. Peter is sort of a celebrity these days—he has been ever since Mysterio outed him to the world—so a) she probably wouldn’t be believed and b) in her experience, most people have _way_ too many questions once they find out. 

So she keeps it to herself. Ignores her classmates when they talk about how hot he is or how much they wish _they_ were dating him, and carefully does not look at the gigantic poster of her boyfriend hanging above her roommate’s bed. 

Like she said: weird. 

Because of her carefully crafted omission of his involvement in her life, her roommates originally assumed she was both single and gay. Tired of this, she’d finally dropped the fact that she _had_ a boyfriend one night while lounging in their shared living space. 

Ashley had been surfing cable. She’d said, “Ugh, _The Price is Right._ I hate that show.” 

MJ had snorted. “Yeah, me too. My boyfriend loves it though. He’s such a grandpa sometimes.”

Like she’d expected, Ashley had _pounced_ on that. She’d drilled MJ in her annoyingly adorable bubbly voice, wide-eyed with excitement. “What does he look like?” “What’s his name?” “Is the sex good?” “How tall is he?” “ _Why_ haven’t you mentioned him before?!”

MJ had remained mysterious. She really wasn’t into, like, sharing. All of her roommates were, though. They would spend hours bitching and moaning about this or that over cookie dough in the kitchen or popcorn on the couch; _my boyfriend did this, my girlfriend said this, he’s lowkey misogynistic sometimes so I think I’m gonna dump him, she’s highkey like really loud but I think it’s really cute._

MJ liked to listen, but she wasn’t into contributing—except for the misogynistic boyfriend, she’d voted ‘dump him’ there. 

So after all of MJ’s non-answers, Ashley had given up. 

Well, it had _seemed_ that way for a couple of days. 

Then she’d started asking, pretty subtly for her, little questions here and there. They were wrapped up in commentary that encouraged an answer, and sometimes MJ found it impossible not to give little bits and pieces away. Pretty soon Ashley also knew that Peter’s parents had died, that he was a physics major ( _ooo, geeky, cute!_ ), that they’d known one another since they were fourteen ( _aww, a childhood romance, that’s_ adorable!). 

Other times, it was impossible _not_ to talk about him just because she missed him so much. She _wanted_ to vent about it, wanted to say things out loud just to remember that they were real. 

All of that and the fact that Ashley _totally_ eavesdropped on her phone conversations with Peter from time to time had given the other girl a pretty well-formed picture of him. 

But she didn’t know his name. She didn’t know that he was a superhero. She didn’t know that he was _Peter freaking Parker,_ her biggest celeb crush _ever._

Which is why MJ is sort of freaking out as she gets ready for the party she’d been dragged into attending. They hadn’t really _planned_ to hang out on Halloween, but Peter’s professors had pushed back exam due dates because, apparently, the MIT faculty is way fucking nicer than the one at Columbia—and now he’s _on his way._

“Are you sure?” MJ had asked, gnawing on a nail and hoping, _praying_ that he was _not sure._

“Yeah, I’m already in New York anyway. I took Morgan trick or treating earlier.”

MJ had pinched the bridge of her nose and forced an excited tone, and then she’d hung up. Now he’s coming and Ashley is gonna find out and so is _everyone else_ —and that had been okay at Midtown where everyone was so listless in the aftermath of the Snap that they could barely remember their own names, much less Peter Parker’s—but now she’s totally and completely fucked, doomed to a life of probing questions and stares and death threats. 

But also: _he’s coming._

It’s been a stupid amount of time since they’ve seen each other, and despite it all, MJ maybe like, misses him or whatever. 

So she distracts herself by listening to the chatter of Ashley, Madison, and Brianna as they curl their hair and try to decide what costume to wear (oh we’re just so _chaotic_ and _last minute!_ ), and put glitter all over their faces, and wonder if their dates will show up.

“MJ, are you _ever_ gonna come out of there?”

“What? Yeah, totally.” She puts her flat iron down and takes a deep breath. Then she steps out into Madison’s room.

Ashely notices first. “Holy _shit!_ ”

“Oh my god.” Brianna chokes on a cupcake. “Oh my _god._ Shut the fuck up. You look so fucking good—holy shit, guys, she looks _so_ fucking good, right?”

“A snack,” Madison agrees. “ _Fuck._ I wish I could pull off red hair.”

Ashley is already up in MJ’s personal space, like, petting it and inspecting her roots and gushing. “You look so different. Like a _good_ different—not that you ever looked bad before, I mean, you’re like, ten out of ten. I _love_ your natural hair—it’s just, like, I’ve never seen it like this and it’s _red_ and—”

“And you’re questioning your sexual orientation?” Madison butts in, jokingly, but when Ashley parries with an, “Oh, shut up,” her shoulders sink with disappointment. MJ is the only one to notice. 

“So it’s okay?”

“Yeah, it’s—” Ashley steps back. Shakes her head. “You’re gonna get so much dick.”

Brianna throws a pillow at that. “Oh my god!” 

“What? _What?_ Am I wrong?”

“Way to sexualise her,” Brianna snaps. “She’s not an _object,_ asshole.”

Ashley tuts. “I’m not gonna get into a debate with you about this. _All_ I’m saying is that you look really good, MJ. Like, _really_ good. I know you’re long-distance dating that guy or whatever but—”

“Wait, _what?!_ ” Madison drops an eyeshadow palette. “You have a boyfriend?!”

MJ rolls her eyes. “ _Yes,_ I do. And he happens to be coming to this stupid party tonight, so I’m trusting you all not to be weird about it, okay? I’m serious.”

Brianna sputters. “You can’t just drop that on us! _Who is he?!_ ”

“Jesus Christ,” MJ groans. She drops down onto the ground to tie her chucks. “It doesn’t matter who he is.”

Except that it so, _so_ matters.

That much is evident when, forty minutes into the party, the atmosphere is suddenly charged with an electric tension. 

There are still people who haven’t seen him; they continue to obliviously dance and drink and laugh and suck face on couches. The music still blares loud enough to rattle the walls, the lights are still flashing: purple, green, blue. 

But there’s whispering. There’s wide eyes. Exclamations of “ _what the fuck?!_ ” And “ _who?!”_ and “ _deadass, bro. just saw him.”_

MJ’s hand tightens around her SOLO cup. She drains it and downs a shot, too, just to calm her nerves. 

Ashley is still chattering on to Madison and her girlfriend, Jaime. It’s a nice distraction. Effective, until—

“Scully, it’s me.”

MJ doesn’t jump. She turns with an air of disinterest, even displeasure. “You’re late.”

“Traffic,” he lies. “Hi.”

He’s grinning. It’s totally stupid and sappy, but MJ always, _always_ feels better just being around him, and seeing his smile is even better. Her thirteen year old self would be utterly disgusted at the way her stomach flips, the way her heart actually starts to speed up. 

“Can I see some identification, agent?”

Peter laughs. He flashes the Fox Mulder replica badge that he’d bought off EBay for like two hundred bucks (he’d also bought the Dana Scully counterpart, which is hanging from the pocket of MJ’s trench coat). 

MJ nods curtly. She scoops up a JELL-O shot and hands it to him, grabs one for herself, and they drink. 

“Oh my god, hi!” Ashley bursts, erupting upon them like a bottle of shaken champagne. “I’m Ashley! You, um—you know MJ?”

“Ashley, this is my boyfriend. Parker, this is Ashley. She’s a roommate.”

“ _She calls him by his last name,”_ Madison whisper-hisses. “ _That is such big dick energy I—_ ”

Ashley and Peter shake hands. Ashley looks like she might faint. “You’re the boyfriend,” she says, forgetting all decorum to openly marvel. “Holy shit.”

“ _Dude,”_ MJ says. 

“I’m _sorry_ it’s just you like—you never talk about him and you _never said—_ ”

“You don’t talk about me to your friends?” Peter asks with fake offense. 

“What’s to tell, Loser?” MJ shrugs and grabs his hand. “Come with me, I wanna show you something.”

The thing she wants to show him is the upstairs bathroom (which is empty, thank God). MJ literally doesn’t even bother with the lights; she’s already kissing him in the hallway, and then they’re stumbling inside, and then her back is up against the door and—

“Wait, wait,” she rips away, face hot. “I actually do have something to show you.”

She takes a deep breath. 

Turns on the light.

“Before you freak out—”

“Oh my god—”

“It’s just temporary—”

“It’s _red—”_

“I know it looks weird, I just—”

“Weird?! It looks fucking _awesome.”_

MJ stops short. Blinks. “You think so?” And then she blurts, “not that I like, need your validation or anything. What I do with my hair isn’t like, dependent on whether or not you like it.”

“Of course.”

He’s not mocking. He really agrees, and he’s looking at her like—like no one _ever_ looks at her, like she’s pretty, like she’s strong, like he really, _really_ loves her. He says it all the time; over the phone, through text, whatever—but God, it’s so much better to just watch him _feel_ it. 

_God’s forsaken me,_ she thinks, because fuck she’s such a goddamn overemotional sap these days. 

“Peter,” she whispers, and that’s when she realises her eyes are burning, and her fingers are curled tight around his coat, because she just… _feels_ too much. She’s feeling too many things and it shouldn’t be scary but it is, and—“I really, really missed you.”

Peter kisses her. It’s not the kind of kiss that means to shut her up; it’s the kind that’s saying something. It means, _me too,_ and the next one: _I love you._

MJ says it back. They say it over and over, in the light and, when MJ eventually reaches over to flick it off, in the dark. 

* * *

Two hours after Peter’s arrival, Ashley says, “She’s drunk.”

Peter, for his part, is inclined to agree. When MJ gets drunk her demeanour does a total one-eighty and she giggles more than she ever would sober. After four drinks she gets touchy. After six she’s a ball of fucking sunshine. It’s both hilarious and terrifying. 

So Peter says, “I’m gonna take her back.”

Ashley is staring at him. She hasn’t stopped since he got here. 

Peter clears his throat. “I don’t know the way to her dorm.”

She blinks. “Right! Right, yeah, I’ll show you.”

Peter nods and goes over to MJ, who’s hanging off of the arm of a couch upside down and trying to recite the alphabet backward. 

“Hey, Dork,” he says. 

MJ grins up at him. “I got to Q.”

“Mad props. I’m gonna take you home now, okay?”

“ _No,_ ” she whines. “I’m—I’m having fun, and—”

“And you’re very, very drunk. Believe me, as impressive as it was to see you crush Peyton Jacobs at beer pong, you’re totally gonna regret it in the morning.”

“I will _never_ regret that,” she says, sitting up so fast their foreheads almost smack together. “Peyton Jacobs is a total douche! _And_ he’s sexist! Just ask Brianna.”

Peter looks at Brianna, who blushes and pretends she wasn’t listening.

MJ scowls. “Well it’s _true._ ” 

“I believe you.”

She looks up at him and grabs onto his jacket. “You know, I think you really do. I really do and I just… I just love you a whole lot, you know? Like some guys are so… so _mean_ and awful and gross but you’re never like that, you don’t even get _mad_ and like, you don’t know how much that means to me. I _hate_ angry people but I’m always _so_ angry and—”

Peter kneels down. “MJ—”

“You’re pretty,” she blurts randomly, squinting at him with a scrunched up face. 

Peter can’t help grinning. “Can I take you home now?”

“Ugh.” She flops down against the cushions. “Don’t feel like walking. Gonna be sick.”

That’s no problem for Peter. He scoops her up and then raises his eyebrows at Ashley, who kind of squawks and proceeds to lead him through the masses of teenagers who are all too drunk to care that he’s Spider-Man. 

Outside, the air is clear and crisp. The ground is wet. 

“We missed the rain,” MJ whines. 

Peter glances down at her. She’s frowning one second and then her head is falling against his shoulder the next, and she starts rambling about how much she hates winter. He hadn’t realised her feelings were so strong. 

“I have _never_ seen her like this,” Ashley whispers as he slips past her to enter the dorm living area. 

“I have,” Peter says. “She’ll be fine, believe me.”

“Fine,” MJ echoes. “ _Supa_ _fine._ ”

“Um,” Ashley swallows. “That way.”

He follows her down a hallway and into a cramped room with two beds separated by a long desk. Peter scans the space. He looks at MJ. “I’m gonna assume your bed _isn’t_ the one with the gigantic poster of me on top?”

MJ busts out laughing. Ashley covers her face with her hands. “God, this is _so_ embarrassing…”

“Don’t worry about it,” Peter says quickly. “Really, it’s no biggie.”

Privately, it feels more surreal than anything else. And yeah, it’s uncomfortable, and also a really _bad_ angle, Jesus Christ—

MJ practically rolls out of his arms. She manages to wriggle out of her coat and then he has to stop her from falling into the desk. “This way,” he says, guiding her toward the bed. 

MJ grunts. She’s weakly yanking at the buttons on her shirt even after she drops onto her mattress. Peter focuses on her shoes, but before he can do more than untie the laces she yanks them away. 

“What was Morgan?” she asks, sitting up.

“Pardon?”

“For Halloween. I never asked.”

Peter smiles. “She wanted to be Hermione Granger. I made her a wand and everything.”

MJ flops back down with a groan. “I _love_ Harry Potter.”

“I know that.” He kisses her temple. “We’ll do it again next year or something.”

“Okay.” She smiles and it’s small this time, almost shy. “I love you.”

Peter kisses her cheek, and then her nose, and her other cheek until she’s curled in a ball and giggling again. “Please and thank you can I take your shoes off now?”

“I _suppose.”_

Through all of this, Ashley’s standing in the doorway alternating between looking away with red cheeks and openly gawking. Peter glances at her when he’s finally satisfied that MJ will be at least marginally comfortable tonight. “Can you grab water and an aspirin for the morning?”

“Right!” she says, looking almost relieved to have something else to do. “Yeah, of course.”

Once she’s gone, Peter kneels beside MJ’s bed. She turns to look at him and her eyes flutter shut when he strokes her hair away from her cheek.

“I know you’re really drunk right now so you’re not gonna remember I said this, but I swear to God, whenever I see you the rest of the world just goes away. It’s like I’m drowning and you’re… you’re coming up for fresh air.”

MJ stares at him for a minute. Then she says, softly, “Your nose is so cute,” and boops him.

Peter grins. “So’s yours.”

“My what?”

“Nothing, baby.”

Instead of protesting like she normally does whenever he slips up and calls her that, her lips turn down and her eyes glisten with tears.

“Hey,” he strokes her cheek gently, “what’s the matter?”

MJ shakes her head. “I just… I just miss being a little kid. I miss being twelve. _Everything_ was okay at twelve. You just... you just worried about whether or not you’d get pancakes or waffles for breakfast or what the popular girls were gonna wear to school that day, you know? I didn’t even know how to think enough to really care about anything. Now I think so much I just get numb.”

Peter listens. He strokes her cheek with his thumb and sits there and just listens, with his head resting against the mattress and her hand in his. He raises it to his lips and kisses her knuckles. 

“Hey,” he says, to regain her wandering attention, “I promise I’m gonna make it okay again. I’m gonna make _everything_ okay someday, just for you. And if your head is too full, you can just tell me, and I’ll carry some of it for you. And I’ll make you pancakes _and_ waffles for breakfast every single morning until we’re ninety years old and pooping ourselves every four hours—”

She starts to giggle here, but Peter doesn’t stop.

“I’m serious. I just want you to be happy. That’s all I want. I’ll do whatever it takes. However you want the world to look, I’ll build it all from scratch.”

“And the pancakes? You’ll make those from scratch too?”

Peter laughs. “And the pancakes.”

“Good. The stuff that comes in the box is disgusting.”

Peter couldn’t agree more. He says as much, and then kisses her, and it’s meant to be a goodnight until she says, “Stay?”

“Of course.”

* * *

MJ wakes up all wrapped up in her idiot boyfriend’s arms. 

For a second she doesn’t even question it. After all, what could be more right than that? He’s warm and he smells good and even if the bed is way too small, it feels like she fits against him just right.

Then she remembers where they are. 

MJ’s eyes fly open. She grimaces even though the curtains are only open a crack and it’s overcast outside anyway. Groggily, she scans the room to find Ashley’s bed empty and (thank God) a glass of water waiting on the nightstand. MJ chugs that and downs the pills beside it, hoping they’re like, Advil or something and not Xanax.

After a few minutes of sitting there kind of hunched over, her head throbbing, she feels marginally better.

“Coffee,” she breathes. “I need coffee.”

It’s like making the trek from the Shire to fucking Mordor, walking from her bedroom to the kitchen. She can hear her roommates talking, and _wow_ they’re fucking loud—

Until they see her. Then they all shut up at once. 

MJ pretends not to notice. She heads for the coffee pot, but Ashley makes a beeline for it and intercepts her.

“You. Absolute. Biatch.”

“Excuse me?”

“I mean I’m not mad, I’m _impressed—_ but like—holy shit, MJ, a little forewarning would have been nice?! Maybe a disclosure on the fact that you’re dating _fucking Spider-Man?!_ I mean God, at least you could have given me a chance to take that stupid poster down!”

MJ starts laughing. She can’t help it. Then Ashley is laughing too. 

“I’m sorry,” MJ says, wiping her eyes. “It was just fuckin’ hilarious so.”

Ashley steps away from the coffee maker, shaking her head. “I can’t believe you. All this time I was picturing some twink in a sweater vest with like, coke-bottle glasses. But _no._ It’s Peter Parker, the biggest celebrity on the planet.”

“He is _not—_ ”

“Yes he is,” Brianna chimes in around a mouthful of strawberry. 

“You guys are overreacting.”

“They kind of aren’t,” Madison says. “I mean, he’s like, _everyone’s_ favorite superhero. Ninety percent of the population would totally bang him if they got the chance! I mean, have you seen the dude? You’ve seen the dude. I’m not even straight and I’d do him.”

MJ narrows her eyes. “Watch it.”

“What? _What?_ I’m just laying out the facts!”

“You people are awful,” she mutters. “ _Vultures._ This is why I didn’t tell you—because I didn’t want to have to deal with _this.”_

Ashley snorts. Then her expression grows thoughtful. “You know, now that you guys are like, ‘out’, I bet you’ll be just as famous as him.”

_Oh, fuck._

“Ooo, yeah!” Brianna snaps her fingers. “Watch out for paps.”

“Maybe we should like, buy one of those suitcases—you know like how they carried Taylor Swift around in before she was Snapped?!”

“Oh my god, yeah!”

They’re all so absorbed in brainstorming how to keep MJ from being noticed, they don’t even see her leave. 

When MJ wanders back into her room, Peter is sitting up in bed scrolling through his phone. He looks up when the door opens and grins. “You brought me coffee?”

“No cream, two sugars.”

He takes it and drinks. “That’s some good crack.”

MJ laughs. She sets her own mug down and perches behind him on the bed so she can wrap her arms around his shoulders. “You have to go back today?”

He sighs. “Unfortunately.”

She nods. Buries her face in the crook of his neck and just breathes for a minute. “Okay. But let’s do something first.”

“Like what?”

“Breakfast,” she decides after a beat. “I’m craving waffles for some reason.”

* * *

Thanksgiving 

* * *

  
“Well this is just sad.”

Steve looks up at her and yeah, it’s pretty pathetic: he takes up almost a whole side of the booth and he’s already eaten half the pie.

“Mr. Johnson owns the diner,” he says, swallowing roughly. “His wife made too many.”

Nat nods. Makes sense. She slides into the seat opposite him and picks up a fork from the second place setting. 

“Haven’t seen you around a whole lot.”

Steve shoves more pie in his mouth just so he doesn’t have to answer right away. Nat daintily scoops some up for herself. 

“I figured you’d need time to heal.”

“No need,” she leans back, “I’m all bright and shiny and new again.”

Steve studies her. He doesn’t really seem to believe it. Nat, for her part, isn’t sure if she does either. 

“You’re not here to drag me off to Moscow, are you?”

“Why? What’s up with Moscow?”

His lip quirks up. “Nothing. What are you doing here, anyway? Shouldn’t you be at the compound?”

Nat shrugs. “Wasn’t invited this year.”

“Oh yeah?” He grabs more pie. “Welcome to the club.”

“Hey, they let you come around for Christmas.”

Steve shakes his head. “It’s uh… it’s not the same.”

He could mean a lot of things by that: like how no Christmas they have will ever compare to that first one they shared, sitting on sofa cushions in the penthouse living room of Stark Tower, watching a rerun of _It’s a Wonderful Life_ and eating a mix of various ethnic foods because they hadn’t been able to decide on one—and none of them were very good cooks.

Or he could mean they only let him come around because it’s the good and right thing to do on a holiday where you just _have_ to be good and right. Maybe he doesn’t understand that Peter feels sorry for him, and that he’s not angry anymore. Maybe he doesn’t get that Pepper is just bitter and looking for somewhere to fuel all of the anger she can’t lash out on Tony because he’s dust in the wind. 

Or maybe, just maybe, there’s an even deeper meaning to it all: maybe he means that the commercialism around the holiday season has cheapened it all for him; that he would rather be stuck back in the forties sitting in a sepia toned apartment with James Barnes, hanging handmade ornaments on a half-sized tree. 

Nat eats some more pie.

“Not half bad,” she comments. “Think she’d be open to giving me the recipe?”

Steve laughs. “Sorry, I just… have a hard time picturing you in a kitchen.”

“What, you don’t think I could do it?” 

He shakes his head, still grinning. Nat kicks his shin. “I could do it.”

“Sure. Yeah.”

“I’ve made things before.”

“Instant mac and cheese doesn’t count.”

“It’s _cooking.”_

“It’s four ingredients and stirring. A pie is only good if you make it with love.”

Nat raises an eyebrow. “Are you saying I don’t have enough heart?”

“I’m _saying,”_ Steve stands, “I don’t think you could figure out how to make the filling before you burned the damn thing.”

“ _Rude.”_ She gets to her feet. “Where are we going?”

“The store.”

“We’re baking a pie?”

“We’re baking a pie. And _then_ we’re going to a meeting.”

“Oh, _boo.”_

* * *

“You burnt it.”

“I didn’t _not_ burn it, _you_ burnt it.”

Peter shoots Pepper a deadpan look over the blackened turkey. “Excuse me, we agreed that I would monitor and baste for the first half of the cooking process and _you_ would do the second half. Or am I mistaken, ma’am?”

Pepper does that flustered thing where she refuses to meet his eyes and puts her hands on her hips. “I—we—we both know that I’m an awful cook!” 

“ _That’s_ your excuse?!”

“Shut up!” She grabs the platter, marches over to the trash can, and dumps it inside. “We’ll start from scratch.”

“Pep, it’s five in the afternoon! We don’t have _time_ to make another and everything else is already ready—”

“Fine! _Fine!”_ She looks around for a minute. “Okay. Get your coat.”

“Get my—what?”

“Would you just listen to me for once in your life?”

“Okay, rude. False. I listen to you _all_ the time.” 

“Your coat!”

Peter starts. “Oh my god, _fine.”_

“And wake Morgan up from her nap, she’s coming too.”

“Coming _where?!”_

* * *

Natasha is browsing the baking aisle when she overhears a tiny voice ask, “Is mommy going crazy?”

Naturally that peaks her interest enough to creep over so she can spy around the corner. They haven’t seen her yet, and despite it being slightly questionable, Nat can’t bring herself to look away. 

“Yes, yes she is. It’s why we’re,” Peter raises his voice, “wandering through a sketchy Quick-E-Mart at _seven in the evening!”_

“Shut up!” Pepper Potts calls back, somewhere deep in aisle 8. 

Nat smirks a little. Of all the places their paths could have crossed since their argument and it’s _here_ in a dilapidated grocery store—one of the only places still open right now. Before the Snap, New York had never slept, not even on Thanksgiving. Nowadays people will look for any excuse to shut themselves up for a day and live in the dark. 

“Are you gonna tell me what we’re doing yet?” Peter asks Pepper, as soon as she returns. 

“It’s a surprise,” Pepper replies, dumping an obscene amount of pre-prepared food and microwave meals into the cart. 

Peter squints. “Last I checked we had like, three guests on our roster.”

“I’m inviting more,” Pepper replies. “Or, we’re the ones inviting ourselves.”

“To an _army base?”_

She laughs. “Shut up. Just go with it.”

“Well in that case, I want those cookies. You know the ones that are only good in theory and then you bite into them and they’re like super dry and really cakey and disgusting?”

“Why the _hell_ would you want those?”

“I live to be disappointed.”

Pepper pinches the bridge of her nose. “You know what I should get you instead?”

“What?”

“An appointment with a therapist.”

“ _Ha ha.”_

And the really sad part is, he could probably use one—but Pepper only meant it as a joke and she’s soon distracted by a cheese tray, and Peter rolls with it, riding the cart down the aisle to make Morgan laugh. Nat is so immersed in her observations that she actually jumps when Steve speaks from behind her. 

“ _God._ What?” 

Steve grins. “I asked if you wanted peach or strawberry filling?”

Nat looks back at Pepper, Morgan, and Peter. “Peach.”

* * *

The clerk is in the back when they go to check out, so Pepper is like, “Just take 600 dollars out of my wallet and put it on the counter!”

Peter stares in abject horror. “The way that you like, carry that amount of cash on you? Oh my god? Are you _asking_ to get robbed?”

“I have a security detail.” 

“I mean, okay, I’m flattered, but still—”

“I meant Happy.”

“I’m unadopting myself from you.”

Pepper laughs. 

* * *

“What are we doing here?!” Ashley hisses. “This place is like, so sketch.”

“It’s a displacement centre,” MJ tells her. “I used to come here all the time. It’s seriously fine.”

It’s actually _more_ than fine considering MJ could just kick the shit out of anyone who decided to jump them, but there’s no one out anyway. It’s _still_ unnerving to see the streets so empty even after all of these years.

It’s windy out, and dark. MJ watches the breeze lift flyers with missing kids’ faces printed on them; they’re carried across the street and wind up in puddles of shallow water. It used to make her bitter thinking of all of those parents who were so desperate to find their kids, hoping that they were just lost instead of gone. She always wondered if her own parents would have done the same. 

Now it’s just sad. It’s a visual personification of how most people have just… given up.

Before she can get too deep in her own emo bullshit, they reach the building. It’s tall and brickwork with faded letters that read REC CENTER 54. 

MJ leads Ashley to the small side door a little ways from the main entrance. She knocks three times and, like she’d hoped, there’s Peter.

“Password?”

“Shut up, Loser.”

“Wow, right on the first try.”

MJ throws her arms around him. He holds her back just as tightly. Sometimes it’s easy; she can immerse herself in school work and forget that there’s a world outside of campus. Other times she just gets so _lonely._ He had been the only person she’d had to lean on after the Snap, and they’d gotten so dependent on each other, it’s kind of ingrained in her now to seek him out before anyone else. Sure, she has other people now. Her roommates are sort of her friends. But he’s still the person she looks for when someone cracks a joke, just to see if he’s laughing too. 

“Hi,” she says, just for him. 

“Hi,” he returns after he pulls back. His eyes drift over her shoulder. 

“Oh, don’t mind me, I’m just out here waiting to get, like, shanked or whatever.”

“Ashley,” Peter says.

Ashley blushes. She’s been doing her best not to be weird about Peter, but MJ’s pretty sure the fact that he remembered her name from last month is like, everything to her. 

“Hey. Hi. Is it weird that I’m here?”

“I invited her,” MJ says. 

Peter shrugs. “The more the merrier.”

* * *

“Would you _please_ enlighten me as to what we’re doing here?”

“Being charitable.”

“Nat, the meeting is in an hour—”

“Shut up and come on, Rogers.”

* * *

“Michelle!”

No one on God’s green Earth is actually allowed to call MJ ‘Michelle’ except for Pepper Potts. MJ has literally never been so glad to see another human being in her entire life and she practically falls into the woman’s offered embrace. 

“How are you doing, sweetie?”

“Hellish,” MJ replies. “How about you?”

“Exhausted. Come help me with the snap peas?” 

MJ obliges, swiftly introducing Ashley on the way, who blurts a long, breathy explanation of being an orphan and having no place else to spend Thanksgiving. Pepper takes it, and her, in stride.

“Shelly!”

Again—no one on God’s green Earth is allowed to call her ‘Shelly’ except for Morgan Potts.

“Morgie!” MJ leans down to scoop her up just in time and presses an obnoxiously Extra kiss to her cheek. Morgan laughs. “I missed you, Pop Tart.”

“’Missed you more,” Morgan replies. “I drew you, even.”

“You did?”

“Mmhm,” she says, and goes on to tell MJ all about the portrait she’d made that’s hanging on her wall, right next to the ones she and MJ had worked on together over summer break. “I don’t think it looks right, though.”

“Well I don’t look right either, so that’s okay.”

Morgan’s face scrunches up. “Nuh- _uh._ I wanna be as pretty as you one day.” 

“Well that’s so interesting because I was _just_ thinking that I wanted to be as pretty as _you_ when I grow up.”

Morgan laughs. “You’re _already_ grown up!”

And isn’t _that_ fucking terrifying.

* * *

“Happy, if you don’t turn that down you’re gonna burn the gravy.”

Happy grunts something that he’d normally just snap if Morgan weren’t in the room. As it is, he turns the stove down and keeps stirring the sauce. Peter returns to the mountains of rotisserie chickens that Pepper had grabbed. He’s been carving them for the last twenty minutes. 

“ _How_ many people are out there?”

“Pep said around three-hundred all in all,” Peter says to Rhodey. 

“Jeez,” the older man mutters. “Okay, pass me the salt.”

Between the six of them—including MJ, Pepper, and MJ’s roommate, Ashley—they’re making pretty good time of it. Pepper had been smart to buy as much already warmed and cooked food as possible; all they have to do is organize it into portions and lay it out all nice and neat. 

Peter is so absorbed in the preparations that he doesn’t notice Natasha until Rhodey says her name. 

Peter freezes. He watches, peripherally, as Nat and Rhodey hug. Steve shakes his hand. They start to talk over Nat’s much shorter head and all the while she’s staring at Peter. 

She slinks over. “We brought pie.”

“I see that.”

“I made it.”

“Did you, now.”

“With love.”

“Love, or spite?”

“You think my pie is a spite pie?”

“I know it’s a spite pie, just like this chicken is spite chicken because you’re standing near it and infecting it with your spite.”

He’s very aware that at this point, some of them have caught on to the tension. Peter still hasn’t told anyone about what happened with Nat; he suspects Pepper might have some idea that they’d fallen out, but she hasn’t asked and so he hasn’t felt the need to say anything. 

Now they’re all curious. God, _why_ had she chosen today to show up? 

Still, he can’t lie: it’s such a fucking relief to see her on her feet. 

“ _Ty v poryadke?”_ He asks. 

Nat’s jaw tightens. “ _Da. Vy?”_

“ _Poryadke._ _Tebe luchshe uyti._ ”

Her shoulders fall. It’s only an infinitesimal amount, hardly noticeable to the naked eye. But Peter sees it and she knows that. 

“Not even on Thanksgiving?”

“Not even,” he counters. 

“ _Petya—_ ”

“Natasha.”

Steve says it. He looks surprised—maybe he hadn’t realised what Peter actually looks like when he’s pissed off. Maybe he’s realising the situation is more precarious than he thought. Nat certainly is, and she doesn’t like it one iota, which means this cold shoulder thing he’s giving her won’t last long. 

But for now, she backs up. Kind of stumbles into Rogers until she catches herself and regains her composure. “Happy Thanksgiving, Pepper.”

A very confused Pepper returns the sentiment. As soon as Nat and Rogers are gone, she rounds on Peter. “What the hell was that?”

“Nothing,” Peter replies, forcefully bright. “Come on, dinner won’t serve itself.”

* * *

“You gonna tell me about it?”

They’re sitting at the bottom of the drained pool in the rec center sharing a pint of ice cream. It’s mint, which happens to be her favourite flavour and Peter’s _least_ favourite, but he’s indulging her. She privately loves him just a little bit more for it and is determined not to let on. 

After a long pause Peter says, “She got shot.”

“Yeah, okay,” MJ shrugs. “Shit happens, so what?”

“In the chest. It pierced her lung. She um—she flatlined on the table and I had to bring her back.”

MJ carefully digs her spoon into the ice cream and then carefully sets the carton aside. She takes a deep breath. “ _What?”_

“Yeah.”

“ _When_ was this?”

“Few weeks ago.”

“And you were gonna tell me when, exactly?”

Peter shakes his head. “No. It’s not—I don’t have any right to—it’s not my secret to tell, okay? She’s… prideful.”

MJ chews on that. He’s right. It would have been pretty shitty of him to just like, gossip about Nat that way. _Still—_

“MJ,” Peter cuts in before she can actually start in on him, “ _please._ I don’t wanna talk about it. Seriously I just… this isn’t a thing that I want to even _think_ about. I just wanna forget, okay?”

Her mouth snaps shut, because—

Because after Sam, she’d felt the same way. He’d respected that. 

“Okay,” MJ nods. “Okay, we don’t have to talk about it.”

He looks so relieved it’s actually painful. MJ can’t think of anything else to do or say, so she resorts to wriggling between his legs to wrap her arms around his chest; to hold and to be held. Peter’s cheek falls to rest against the top of her head. 

“Everything’s gonna be okay,” she promises. 

Peter doesn’t get a chance to say anything, because the doors burst open and through them comes Ashley. She blushes. “Oh. Oh, um, I’m sorry. I was just—I just wanted to be alone for a second. I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine.” MJ slowly pulls back from Peter. “I should go.”

“You’re sure?”

She nods. “I’ll come by this weekend, okay?”

“Yeah. Yeah, okay.”

* * *

Ashley is staring at her. 

“Dude. What is it.”

“I just… I don’t know!” Ashley chews her lip. “It’s just that my parents’ marriage kind of sucked, so I don’t really have a great baseline for romance but… you two kind of make me believe in it again.” Ashley grimaces like she’s tasting something bad. “Whatever.”

MJ stays in place even when Ashley keeps marching down the sidewalk—until she realises she’s all alone. She rounds. “ _MJ.”_

“What?”

“Are you coming?”

“Yeah, um—I just—I just forgot something. Just stay here, I’ll be right back.”

* * *

He’s still in the pool, lying on his back with his arms folded behind his head. He sits up when she comes back in though, and asks, “Did you forget something?”

MJ drops into the pool. “Uh-huh,” she says, breathless when she kisses him and breathless when she pulls away. Over and over and over, she peppers his cheeks and nose and forehead and eyelids with kisses. 

Peter puts his hands on her face. He’s smiling. He’s so happy. “What was that for?”

“I love you,” she blurts. “More than anyone in the whole world. And I know you can’t say it back because you have Pepper and Morgan and—I get it—but I just… I just need you to know that.”

Peter stares at her for a few seconds with his mouth parted like he’s in shock or something. Then he’s kissing her, and it’s not harder than he ever has before or fervent or hot, it’s just… gentle. It’s like there are a thousand and one meanings beneath its soft surface and she will spend an eternity just thinking about this one fucking kiss and all of the things he’s trying to say with it. 

“MJ! You can’t just leave me out on the streets to get stabbed so you can make out with your boyfriend!”

MJ’s face heats up. She makes to pull away but Peter doesn’t let go. “Stay?”

“Peter—”

“Happy can drive her home,” he throws out. “Come on, _stay._ The Mongoose misses you.”

MJ bites her lip. She shoots Ashley a pleading look. The other girl throws her head back and groans. “God, _fine._ Is Happy that big sweaty guy?”

* * *

Christmas

* * *

“Mission report.”

Morgan taps the colander she’s wearing on her head. “Mission status: in progress, sir,” she says. “Whisking eggs.”

“And doing a damn fine job of it too, cadet,” Peter shoots back. He, too, is wearing a colander on his head, a totally irrelevant fact.

Morgan laughs. She’s sitting on the kitchen table in a mess of scattered flour and baking ingredients, sporting streaks of melted chocolate on her face and hands. When she really gets concentrating her lip pokes out from between her teeth, a habit he still finds himself trying to break to this day. Sometimes shit like that makes him start thinking, and then he spaces off trying to imagine Tony Stark looking that kiddish, eyebrows all scrunched up together. 

“I need more sugar!”

Peter diligently measures out a fourth of a cup and passes it along to her. He can’t help laughing when she starts to splash it everywhere. 

“Can I take over?”

“No sir,” she replies. “The mixture is almost alam-amaln-”

“Amalgamated?”

“Amalgamated!” She scowls. “I knew that.”

Peter backs off, amused. When she finally finishes whisking, he announces that it’s time to add the dry and wet ingredients together, to which she starts drumming her colander hat. 

Morgan watches while he makes the dough. She holds his shirtsleeve absentmindedly to stay balanced. 

“Can I taste it?”

“You shouldn’t,” he says. “Raw eggs.”

Morgan’s nose scrunches up. “What’s so bad about raw eggs?”

“Salmonella.”

“But I _like_ salmon.”

Peter has to stop mixing just to laugh. Morgan gets even more frustrated by that. “You’re mean,” she snaps.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry—”

She clambers down from the table.

“Hey—where are you going?”

“To get the ’prinkles.”

“We don’t put those on until _after,_ Mongoose—”

“No!”

And that, really, is all there is to it. When Morgan’s made up her mind about the way something should go, there’s absolutely no use arguing with her. He’s learned from experience that most times, she’ll just find a way to Do The Thing Anyway. 

Which means the cookies will come out looking like unicorn crap, but Peter doesn’t care. As long as Morgan likes them. 

They sit in front of the oven to watch them cook. 

“Petey?”

“Yeah?”

“How come I don’t see Aunty Nat anymore?”

He frowns at that. “What do you mean?”

Morgan shifts, changing the angle her legs are tucked beneath her and fixing her shimmery silver skirt. She’s been excited to wear it ever since Pepper took it out of the box, and now that it’s _finally_ Christmas, she’s been ‘breaking it in for the festivities’. 

“She always comes by Mommy’s office, or we go to her’s. Or sometimes she even comes here and brings me one of those little lemon cakes from the place by the library, but I haven’t seen her since before _Halloween._ ”

Peter gnaws on the inside of his cheek, thinking. Yeah, sure, he and Nat are in kind of a rough patch. They haven’t talked or even been in the same room since the whole fiasco with Steve. And it’s not really that Peter is pissed at her, he just wishes—more than anything—that she would value her own life as much as he does. 

He hadn’t expected the shit that’s going on between them to carry over into Morgan and Pepper’s lives, though. 

Morgan clambers into his lap and grabs his face with her (very cold) hands, pulling it down so they’re eye-to-eye. “You haven’t seen her either,” she assesses. “Do you miss her, too?”

“Yeah,” he says, wrapping his arms around her. He rests his cheek on top of her head when she leans in to hug him. 

“I bet she misses us back.”

* * *

It’s snowing. 

Peter watches it fall in windswept flurries through the bay windows of the apartment. It had been freezing when he’d come in through them, and even though he’s since turned on the heat, the place still feels dark and empty; hard in a way that a place that’s been lived in this long just _shouldn’t._

He’d turn on a light, but that would kill the element of surprise.

Instead he waits in the dark with his elbows resting against the kitchen table. Pepper _still_ gets on his case for that habit, but he’s pretty at peace with the fact that it’s one he’ll never kick.

A long time later, when the bazaar down the block has started playing Christmas music and the lights of the neighboring complexes have flicked on, the lock in the front door clicks. 

Nat enters with her gun in hand, tense and alert. 

Peter reaches over and flicks on the light.

The gun slowly lowers.

“Didn’t think you’d be here,” she says.

Peter shrugs. “Didn’t think you would, either.”

“Why not? It’s my house, after all.” 

Peter watches her set her gun down on the counter. She goes to the fridge and grabs two beers—which happens to be the only thing in there, horrifyingly enough.

“It’s not really what I’d call homey.”

“Got something to say about my decorating skills?”

There’s nothing wrong with her decor, but he’s pretty sure she hadn’t had a hand in it anyway: everything is too curated and modern for her taste. He’s pretty sure, if she were ever to buy a place that she really wanted to live in, that it would look a lot more like Pepper’s: comfortable and contemporary. 

So he says, “No.”

Nat seems surprisingly wary. She’s trying hard to cover it up, making bold moves with surety, but he can see it all in her eyes. He can tell by the way she reaches out to set his drink in front of him, rather than around his shoulder like she might normally do. 

Peter waits for her to sit down before he drinks. 

“How often are you here?”

She shrugs. “Maybe once or twice a month. Water the plants and all.”

“I didn’t see any plants.”

She points the mouth of her bottle toward a tiny cactus in a pot by the window. 

“His name is _Ostryy._ ”

Peter stares. “You named your cactus ‘sharp’?”

Nat smirks. “I like names that match personalities.”

“Well if that’s the case, then yours should be _Samoubiystvennyy.”_

She rolls her eyes. “That’s low, even for you.”

“Is it?”

“You’re being unfair,” she says. “I’m not actively trying to get myself hurt—”

“No, but you’re not doing much to prevent it either!” He doesn’t mean to snap, but it happens anyway. He’s out of his chair and scrubbing a hand down his face, tired. Just so, _so_ tired. “You keep putting yourself into these situations, you keep seeking out dangerous missions—”

“Dangerous by your standards, maybe.”

“ _Nat,_ ” he says, and then can’t think of anything else to say except: “I love you. You’re my sister, okay? So stop being stupid. Stop lying to me. Stop almost dying and _please,_ for the love of God, stop denying the fact that you’re too afraid to slow down because you don’t like what might catch up to you.”

Nat’s mouth closes. She swallows roughly. “Peter…”

“You’re family. I can’t lose—I can’t lose you. Or anyone else. Do you have _any_ idea how fucking _terrified_ I was—God, there was so much _blood—”_

Nat blinks. Then says, sharply, “Sit down.”

He knows that tone means no-nonsense, so he does. Also, he’s exhausted. A chair would be nice.

Nat studies him for a long second and then, with warm hands, reaches out and grabs his face. She locks eyes with him.

“I am not indestructible. I’m not invincible. I’m flesh and bone, and I bleed just like everyone else—”

“Did you psychoanalyse me—”

“Shut up. I’m not here to be your hero. I’m not Tony or Steve or Sam, okay? I’m _me,_ and I’m good with guns and I’m good with lying, and I can take out the bad guys with my eyes closed, but I’m not perfect. You’ve had me on a real tall pedestal for a long time but now you get it: you get that I’m on the ground just like you, and now you’re scared.”

Peter bites his tongue. Looks down, away. 

“...Maybe.”

“Good. You should be. Fear is what keeps you and the other guy alive.”

“Nat—”

Before he can even process it, she’s surging forward to wrap him in her arms. 

They don’t like, _do_ hugging. Peter is a hugger. Nat _can_ be, if she likes you enough, or she needs to pick your pocket. But now they’re hugging, and she’s trying not to cry but it’s in her breathing and in her voice. 

“I love you too. More than anyone in the world, understand? I would do anything for you. But I need you to do something for me: I need you to stay scared. I need you to be _terrified_ because sometimes—sometimes I’m not scared enough, and it never ends well.”

“You’re saying I get to be paranoid and keep you in check?”

She laughs, watery. “Yeah.”

He pulls back. Wipes her tears away. “But you’ll try? To be careful, I mean?”

“What did I just say, nimrod? _Anything.”_

Peter smiles. It feels like it’s been months since he’s really done that, or felt this light. Giving her the cold shoulder had been harder on him than he’d realised, and now he just feels drained like he’s run fifty miles. 

He sniffs. Nat grins at that, and then her eyes fall to the two horribly wrapped boxes sitting on the table, ignored until now.

“What are those?”

“What, these?”

“Are those _presents?”_

“Hmm?”

“For me? You shouldn’t have.”

“Maybe I didn’t,” he says loftily, “maybe I just felt like spicing up your place. Maybe the boxes are empty.”

“Peter.”

“I mean seriously, you don’t even have a tree—”

“ _Give.”_

He hands them over and Nat _tears_ into the first one. She lifts the lid to reveal half a dozen unicorn poop cookies. 

“Morgan and I made them,” he says. “They’re… really sweet.”

Nat takes one and carefully breaks a piece off to try. He doesn’t think he’s ever seen her expression so soft and sad at the same time, like she’s remembering something she’d rather not, but at the same time is glad to have lived it. 

“You okay?”

“I’m good,” she says quickly. “They’re not too sweet.”

Peter shrugs. “Open the little one.”

She does, and she’s much more careful about unwrapping it. Maybe she can just sort of sense it’s ridiculously and stupidly expensive, or maybe she just wants to savor the moment. 

Gingerly she pulls out the little white box. She lifts the lid, and inside on a cushioning of foam, there’s a bracelet. 

For a long time they both just look at it. Him, anxious. Her, stunned. 

“Petya…”

“I bought it last week,” he says, rambling. “I know you’re not really one for jewelry, so if you want to, you can just take it back. I just—I saw the slippers and I thought of you. I know you don’t like to talk about your life before like, 2011 or whatever, but I know you used to dance. I can tell because I used to dance too and—”

“God, shut up, you’re killing me,” she hisses. “It’s perfect. I didn’t know— _Jesus,_ Peter.”

He laughs. “So you like it?”

“I _love_ it.”

At her request he helps her clasp it around her wrist. “You can add more, you know. For all of the parts of you that you want to remember.”

Nat holds the silver ballet slippers up to eye level. She is smiling. “You’re a real sap, you know that?”

“Only for you.”

“And Pepper, and Morgan, and MJ, and—”

“Okay, okay, you don’t need to go listing the whole damn village.”

Nat snorts. She shakes the charm a little. “Thank you, _malen'kiy brat.”_

“Yeah, whatever,” he shrugs, “Merry Chrysler and all that. Just be grateful I didn’t show up on your doorstep with apology cards and a boom box.”

“You’re a real dumbass sometimes, Parker.”

“Yeah, but you love me.”

“Maybe.” She smirks. “Come on, I want dumplings.”

“God, the way that you just, like, _get_ me.”

Their shoulders brush in the hallway. They wait for the elevator together and once inside, Peter asks Nat, “Did you purposefully ignore Morgan so that she would try to get me to talk to you?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I love Morgan. I would never do such a devious and underhanded thing.”   
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> translations -  
> italian: "Beautiful" & "'took you long enough"  
> russian: "Are you okay?", "yeah, you?", "fine. you should go."


	5. MISSION: FRANCE

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “She doesn’t have eyebrows.”
> 
> “You’re standing in front of what most would consider to be the most famous portrait in the world,” Nat says dryly, “and _that’s_ your first observation?”
> 
> Peter tilts his head. “It’s disturbing. I’m disturbed. And I don’t like sepia-toned things.”
> 
> She laughs outright. “You’re an idiot, you know that?”
> 
> He shrugs. “Everyone’s a critic.” 
> 
> She huffs, probably more than fed up with his bullshit after being forced to listen to his commentary for the last two hours. Oh well, she’s the one that’d dragged him here. 
> 
> “Our target?”
> 
> “Checking out _The Virgin and Child with Saint Anne,”_ Peter reports. “If I’m being honest I prefer _The Virgin of the Rocks.”_
> 
> “And I prefer the virgin to actually do his job.”

“She doesn’t have eyebrows.”

“You’re standing in front of what most would consider to be the most famous portrait in the world,” Nat says dryly, “and _that’s_ your first observation?”

Peter tilts his head. “It’s disturbing. I’m disturbed. Also I don’t like sepia-toned things.”

She laughs outright. “You’re a dumbass, you know that?”

He shrugs. “Everyone’s a critic.” 

She huffs, probably more than fed up with his bullshit after being forced to listen to his commentary for the last two hours. Oh well, she’s the one that’d dragged him here. 

“Our target?”

“Checking out _The Virgin and Child with Saint Anne,”_ Peter reports. “If I’m being honest I prefer _The Virgin of the Rocks.”_

“And I prefer the virgin to actually do his job.”

“Funny.”

“Wasn’t it?”

“No.”

She mutters something rude in Russian that makes his lips twitch. He slides away from the Mona Lisa and decides to circle a marble statue instead. It provides a better vantage point while remaining inconspicuous. 

Frans Mäkinen suspects nothing—or if he does, he’s very good at hiding it. Unlike the last guy Peter tailed, Frans is perfectly sociable rather than a nervous wreck. He stands with a crowd of people about ten percent less pretentious than him who all listen carefully as he explains _Da Vinci’s_ technique and intent. 

What a loser. 

“He’s going to leave soon,” Peter says. “Are you in position?”

“If by position you mean sitting on his kitchen counter then yes.”

Peter closes his eyes momentarily. “Can’t you just, like, sit in a chair like a normal person?”

“I’m Russian,” Natasha reminds him. “Russians like flare.”

“You mean Russians are extra as fuck.”

“I don’t speak millennial.”

“Okay, boomer.”

She laughs. It’s hard not to laugh with her. It’s only been six days since they made up but they’re already back on their bullshit. Nat had climbed into his bedroom window at five in the morning via the fire escape and briefed him on the situation. Now, he’s wandering the Louvre waiting for an evil scientist to wrap up so he and Nat can catch the guy in their hastily constructed spider sandwich. 

Or web. 

Whatever. 

“He’s shaking hands,” Peter reports. “I’m gonna tail him.”

“Remember to keep your distance.”

“What am I to you, an amateur?”

* * *

It’s ten in the evening by the time Frans makes it back to his flat. It’s a big place, fancy and ornamental. Nat’s been lounging on the couch for a good ten minutes nursing a glass of wine. 

Frans stops dead when he sees her there. He is so startled, in fact, that he doesn’t notice the way the door fails to close behind him; nor does he see Peter quietly slip from one shadow to the next. 

“ _Pardon,_ ” he says. “I believe you have the wrong apartment, madame.”

“Oh, no, I’m exactly where I want to be.” Nat smiles. “Come sit, Dr. Mäkinen.”

The Finnish doctor eyes her warily. “Please, I want no trouble. If you don’t leave I will be forced to call the authorities—”

“Oh? And are you planning on telling them about this?”

She kicks the metal briefcase open to display the syringes, neatly packaged and tucked into place. Frans pales considerably. 

“You don’t know what that is.”

“If I didn’t why would I be here?”

He sits. 

“Madame—”

“Cut the bullshit,” Nat commands airily, leaning back. “You know who I am.”

“Ms. Romanov,” he corrects. His forehead shines in the firelight. She can’t see his eyes with the way his glasses reflect the flames. He looks like the devil. “There is much you do not understand about the product at your feet. The potential—it is volatile—”

“I understand as much as I need to,” Nat says. “For example: I know that you’re one of seven incredibly rich scientists who believe Thanos had the right of it when he snapped half the population. In fact, you believe he should have taken it one step further and wiped out _all_ life. So you holed yourself up in a lab for a few years until you came out with just the thing: a virus that would spread like wildfire, for which there is no existing cure. Except, of course, your little contingency plan.” She kicks the case again. “This is all that exists of the vaccine, correct?”

He swallows. “That is correct.”

“You were going to administer it to your friends tomorrow morning and release the virus in two weeks’ time. Or do I have my facts wrong?”

“No, Ms. Romanov. You are quite right.”

“You’re perspiring, Dr. Mäkinen.”

“I am nervous.”

“Why so? I’m unarmed.”

“But your friend in the corner is not.”

Nat raises an eyebrow. He had to have accounted for that, rather than actually seen Peter. No one she trained could possibly be so clumsy as to reveal themself. 

“Don’t worry about him,” Nat says breezily. “You have your contingency plan, I have mine.”

Frans pulls a handkerchief out of his breast pocket. He dabs at his forehead. “If you are going to kill me, Ms. Romanov, then get on with it.”

There’s a particular emphasis placed on his last words; he nearly shouts them. The hair on the back of Nat’s neck rises and the next thing she knows, there’s the suppressed sound of a bullet being fired through a silencer. 

A thud. Nat had tucked and rolled on instinct. She gets to her feet, gun drawn from the holster on her thigh and trained on Frans’ forehead. 

Peter skirts around her. He kneels down and feels for the pulse of the security detail that had been about to kill her.

“He’s dead.”

Nat raises an eyebrow at Frans. “Seriously?”

He’s really sweating now. “You have no idea the powers that you are dealing with—”

“The minute you start to measure your dick against mine is the minute you lose,” Nat snaps. She glances at Peter. He looks stoic. “That guy wasn’t in here when I first swept the place. Poke around, make sure no one else snuck in.”

He nods and silently goes to complete the order.

Nat knows there’s no one else. 

She just doesn’t want him to have to watch anyone else die tonight. 

* * *

Later, she puts the Quinjet on autopilot and slides out of the cockpit. 

Peter is sitting at the table with his 9 mil disassembled across its surface. He’s polishing the parts and perfectly aware of her presence beside him, but keeps ignoring her for a good minute or so. 

“Peter.”

“Natasha.”

“Come on, don’t clam up on me.” She pokes his shoulder. “What you did tonight—”

“I know,” he says. “I know you’re just gonna tell me it was what had to be done and that I shouldn’t beat myself up over it.”

Nat rests her cheek on her hand. “I’m really that predictable, huh?”

“I just wish it hadn’t come to that. Also, apparently I fucked the whole thing up, so.”

Shifting uneasily, Nat tries to find the right words. “I’m a spy, Parker, not some rooftop-jumping archer, shield-wielding super-soldier, or shiny-metal philanthrobot. Espionage is shadow warfare. I’ve been doing it my whole life. I know how to see it in someone else.”

She locks eyes with him. “I see it in you. I don’t know how to explain it, it’s... It’s like muscle memory clicking into place sometimes. Like it’s already ingrained.”

Peter doesn’t believe her, she knows, but it’s true. Sometimes it’s scary. Sometimes she doesn’t even _have_ to tell him how to do something. There are areas, of course, that have taken coaching: moral areas, like how to lie well, how to fight with the intent of hurting or killing, how to pull the trigger like he had tonight. But sometimes he just slips into it so well it takes her by surprise. It’s like second nature to him. 

“I just…” he sighs. “I’m just really tired and I wanna go home.”

Nat nods slowly. “We’re en-route and should touch down in an hour or so. Why don’t you catch some sleep, okay? I’ll finish this.” 

* * *

Two hours later, after a quick shower at the compound and a change of clothes, Peter walks into a run down diner in Manhattan and drops into the seat opposite his friend. 

Harley looks up with a bland, unamused expression. He’s taking notes on something, but Peter isn’t about to ask what. 

“You gonna eat that?”

He doesn’t wait for a reply, but snatches up the burger and takes a huge bite. Chews for a good minute while glaring out the window. Harley just stares. 

“You know the first rule of the Hippocratic Oath?”

“ _Primum non nocere,_ ” Harley says dryly. 

“Do no harm,” Peter agrees. He takes another bite, chews, and swallows. “What are we doing?”

Harley’s brows scrunch together. “What do you mean?”

“I _mean,_ you and me—this thing? What progress have we even made? We just keep going in circles. Don’t you ever think—”

“ _Peter—_ ”

“Don’t you ever think maybe we should just stop while we’re ahead? Before we potentially mess everything up ten times more than it already is? I mean—who are we to play with this shit, you know? We’re not God. Half of all life was already destroyed. What happens if we ruin what’s left?”

Harley doesn’t like this. His knee is starting to bounce. He shakes his head. “We won’t.”

“You don’t know that.”

“Peter,” he runs a hand down his face, “it’s all just theoretical.”

“Until it isn’t.”

Harley glares. “Give me my burger back.”

Peter sets it down on the plate. Harley stares at it for a good thirty seconds, disgusted, before proclaiming, “Nevermind, I don’t want it.”

“Harley,” Peter leans forward, “I think we should stop.”

“And I _don’t,_ ” Harley snaps. “Not when there’s even the slightest chance that what we’re working on could bring them back.”

“What about the chance that it could kill everyone we have left?”

“We won’t—”

“You don’t _know_ that,” Peter says. “You can’t. Mistakes happen all the time. There are so many variables to consider here and we’re wasting so much fucking time on this. We’ve gotten _nowhere._ ”

“We have a foundational theory—”

“And no way to apply it.”

“ _Peter,_ ” Harley snaps, and then sighs. He slumps back in his seat, tiredly rubbing his eyes. It’s taking a toll on him, too. All of this is. They’re bleeding themselves dry over something they can’t even test. 

Harley’s hand falls. He looks devastated. “What else are we supposed to do?”

“Live,” Peter says. “Move on.”

“I don’t know if I can…”

“I don’t know if I can either,” Peter agrees. “But don’t you think we should at least try?”

“I…” Harley runs a hand through his hair. “Every time I think about it—about her—I tell myself it doesn’t matter because one day I’ll bring her back. Never even let myself be sad about it. Now I… I don’t know how to just… let her go like that.”

Peter nods. He gets that, he really does. A part of him feels guilty for even suggesting this; after all, if it were Tony in his place, wouldn’t he spend every waking hour trying to find a way to reverse the snap? He probably would’ve already done it by now. 

So much for the apple not falling far from the tree. 

“She wouldn’t want this for you,” Peter finally says. “She’d want… she’d want you to try and be human again.”

“And what about him?”

Peter shifts. “I don’t know. I think no matter what, I’m always gonna feel like I failed him. Morgan is four years old, you know? Every day that passes is another one he missed. It’s already too late.”

Harley shakes his head. “Man, what brought this on? Where have you been?”

Peter doesn’t wanna talk about that. He bites his tongue, fishes his wallet out, and drops a twenty on the table. “Doesn’t matter.”

“Uh, I beg to fucking differ.”

He stands. Harley does too. 

It’s funny, because when Peter first came to MIT he was scared shitless and all alone and completely out of his depth—and then he’d met Harley, and he’d gotten swept up in a relentless hurricane of all-nighters and maniacal laughter and stomach aches from too much Taco Bell and warmth, and home, and this is his _brother._

Peter smiles. “Hey, Huck?”

“What?” 

Peter hugs him. Harley stumbles back a little with the force behind it, and after a stunned second, awkwardly reciprocates. “...Why.”

“Just don’t hate me for this, okay?”

“You’re one dumb sonnuva bitch if you think I could ever,” Harley says, stepping back. He claps Peter’s shoulder. “Merry Christmas, ya filthy animal.”

Peter grins. “And a happy new year.”

  
  


* * *

“MJ! GET DOWN HERE!”

MJ lazily raises her head from a page in her child psych book that she’s been studying for the last, like, ten minutes straight. She’s so fucking bored that nothing is interesting anymore. Hoping for better prospects, she sets aside her notebook and throws a sweatshirt over her head before stumbling down the narrow stairwell. 

The last thing she expects is to find Peter in the kitchen. 

They’d said their (albeit temporary) goodbyes yesterday morning before she’d been driven back to her dorms by Happy. Sure, spring term doesn’t start back up for another week, but while Pepper’s apartment is comfortable, it’s not _home._ Right now her dorm is about the best she’s got (even if she _does_ share half of the room with a girl that’s obsessed with MJ’s boyfriend). 

Speaking of which, Ashley is on the verge of hyperventilating—or cutting her finger off, whichever comes first. 

“Dude,” MJ says, “hand eye coordination.”

Ashley flushes. She drops the knife and the cheese block. “Your boyfriend is here,” she squeaks.

“I can see that.”

Peter smiles. He looks tired and rumpled but happy to see her. He’s _always_ happy to see her. She can remember even before they started dating: right after the Snap when the world was a bleak, grey place, and the students walked like zombies through the school hallways. He would too until he saw her. Then it was kind of like the sun rising, but in her chest and on his face.

It had been terrifying for a while that she could have that kind of effect on someone; that anyone could have that kind of effect on _her._ MJ had been pretty convinced she was gonna live a life without love, that her story would play out the way Jo March’s had. Instead she’d ended up an Amy. Who would’ve thought. 

“You look tired,” she says, stepping around him to grab a glass from the cupboard. “Where were you?”

“France.”

MJ flicks the tap to cold. “That guy with the virus?”

He hums. Pinches the bridge of his nose. It’s a stress tell; he thinks she’s gonna get on his case for not taking her, but not this time. Not with the bags under his eyes and the way his shoulders are sagging. 

She’s not stupid. She knows something is wrong. 

So she hands him the water. Peter opens his mouth but no sound comes out, so he drinks instead. 

All of this is totally freaking Ashley out. It’s obvious that she’s listening to them, no matter how much attention she’s supposedly devoting to preparing dinner. 

Peter seems to catch on. He sets the glass down and takes MJ’s hand. “Come with me. I wanna take you somewhere.”

“It’s two hours until midnight.”

“We got time, I promise.”

* * *

“A graveyard?”

“Yeah, I know, it’s super bleak—”

“Uh, _no,_ it’s fucking awesome.” MJ takes his hand. “I’ve never been to one of these before. This is _so_ Buffy.”

Peter laughs. “Come on, this way.”

He leads her through rows of headstones. There’s no low-hanging fog like in a ‘monster of the week’ X-Files episode, but the grass is soft and unusually green for winter, and slick with dew. It’s only when they stop in front of a particular plot that MJ realises he hadn’t just taken here because he’s fucking weird and so is she. 

“Those are my parents,” he tells her, voice soft and melancholic like she’s never heard it. “And this is Ben.”

MJ slowly lets go of his hand. She drifts over to the first headstone, the one with the epitaph that reads RICHARD & MARY PARKER. 

“They were buried together?”

He nods. “They died together. I guess it only seemed right.”

Her hand carefully brushes away the wetness and the flecks of soil atop the stone. She stands there for a minute and thinks about it; about death, a concept she’s fleetingly entertained before. Only in bursts and only long enough to determine it has no merit in the decision making of Do or Do Not. But now she thinks about it: would she want to be buried? Burned? Scattered across the Long Island Sound or the hills of California? 

Would she want to be with Peter? 

“I usually come here after the holidays,” Peter says. “Normally alone, but I just… I wanted you to meet them.”

MJ nods. She isn’t exactly sure what to say to that. What does she have to offer, anyway, that matches the magnitude of it? 

Peter doesn’t seem to expect a reply. He’s looking down at his uncle’s headstone, and then he’s pulling a dirty baseball out of his jacket pocket. “So the Yankees were playing the Braves when it all happened. They were up by two when Chapman pitched, but Hamels wasn’t there to hit it. The ball landed in the left field and I guess no one ever bothered to pick it up. Anyway, I’m gonna leave it here because I know you fuckin’ hated the Yankees, so just be glad most of the Mets survived and Citi Field still looks okay.”

He sets the ball on top of the grave. 

“Oh, and this is MJ.”

MJ steps closer to him. She reads Ben Parker’s engraving: LOVING HUSBAND, UNCLE & FRIEND. She says, “Hi.”

Peter’s lip twitches. “I’m realising now that this is probably incredibly awkward for you.”

MJ shrugs. “I’m okay.”

“What? Oh, I was talking to Ben,” he says, and then grins. MJ socks his arm. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. Seriously, we can go if you want.”

“No, it’s fine.” And then MJ surprises even herself by sitting down in the grass. She reaches and pulls Peter down to sit with her. “Tell me about him.”

Peter doesn’t talk about his uncle much. In fact, he rarely talks about any of the people he’s lost. MJ knows basic things: his parents died in a plane crash, his uncle was shot right in front of him. That’s about the extent of it. 

She hadn’t known him for the former, but they’d been in freshman year when Ben had died. She remembers one day Peter Parker had been perfectly anonymous and only she had cared enough to pay attention to him, solely because she thought he was sort of (kind of maybe a little bit) cute. He had laughed a lot, and smiled a lot, and generally seemed like a really happy kid. 

Then it was like a switch being flicked and all that light was gone. His feet dragged, his shoulders slumped. He crowded into himself while all their classmates whispered about what a sad little charity case Peter Parker was. It had infuriated her, but she’d been too nervous to say anything. 

At least now she can help. Maybe it’s not perfect, and maybe it’s late, but it’s something. 

“He was, uh—” Peter clears his throat. “He was like, this really buff guy. Like, when I say buff, I mean like, Steve Rogers buff. Six feet tall, stacked, a beard, the whole shebang. I was _terrified_ of him for the longest time. I didn’t want to go near him, I didn’t want him to go near _me,_ and he was so huge I don’t really think I even registered what his face looked like until I was maybe four. Anyway, after my parents died I was kind of scared to go live with May and Ben because—while I loved May—I had to put up with Paul fucking Bunyan, you know?” 

They both snort. “So it’s like weeks of me hiding in my room and May and Ben totally think it’s because I’m all fucked up about my parents—which was probably part of it, but I don’t remember—and then finally Ben is like, ‘I should probably talk to this kid,’ which is definitely the _last_ thing I wanted. But there he was: a giant in my doorway watching me while I pretended to sleep. He did that for like three nights until finally he worked up the courage to actually sit by my bed, and then one night I accidentally opened my eyes while he was watching me, and we both just kind of… stared.” 

Peter stops for a second. His head tilts. “And then I just started crying. And it wasn’t because I’d been caught, and I think I stopped being afraid the first night he sat down.”

“So why?”

Peter looks at her. There are tears in his eyes. “It’s ’cuz he’d shaved the stupid beard and he looked like my dad.”

It hits her like a sucker punch, the way it probably had for him at four years old. MJ reaches out and takes his hand. 

Peter keeps talking. “I was so upset I couldn’t even remember to be scared. And he just pulled me into his arms and held me and told me everything was gonna be okay, that he was sorry, that he loved me, and I’d _never_ felt that safe. I felt like nothing could touch me. I felt like, even if the bad guys come one day, they’ll have to go through him to get through me, and he’s made of like, concrete.”

Another pause. MJ has a feeling she knows what’s coming next, so she scoots closer. 

“Then they did get through him. It was, uh—it was raining. I’d snuck out because we’d fought earlier about, like, curfew or some stupid bullshit, and he tracked me down. We were arguing in this alley and this guy ran out of the convenience store I’d been in, and he was holding a gun. Ben was a cop so it was like, second nature for him to stop things like that, you know? And the next thing I know he was…”

MJ reaches up and quietly, gently, brushes a tear from his cheek. 

“It wasn’t your fault.”

“If I hadn’t—”

“ _Peter._ ” He stops. “Look at me.” He looks. MJ brushes his hair back, even though it’s cropped shorter these days. “You were just pulling the same shit that every teenager pulls. If every kid lost a parent every time they acted out, we’d all be orphans. What happened was _out of your control.”_

“But I—”

“No buts.”

“Yes ma’am.”

He clearly doesn’t believe it. MJ runs her fingers through his hair down to the base of his neck and leans forward to kiss his cheek. She may not be a gigantic, buff dude, but she’ll give what she can. 

He leans his head on her shoulder. Breathes in and out. “This is gonna sound stupid.”

“Everything you say sounds stupid.”

“Funny,” he says. “But I mean it.”

“Okay.” She keeps stroking the back of his neck. “Tell me. I promise I won’t laugh.”

“I think I might be cursed.”

MJ’s eyes narrow. “Cursed?”

“First my parents, then Ben, then May and Tony?” He shakes his head. “I have this really dumb, irrational fear that next it’ll be Pepper. If she weren’t so likeable I probably would have shunned her just to make sure she stayed alive.”

MJ ruminates over that for a good minute before countering with, “You’re not cursed.”

“How do you know?”

“You’re not. You just have… bad luck. You lost but you never gave up on loving, so you kept losing. Everyone loses people, Peter.” She sighs. “It’s not irrational, it’s… trauma. It’s grief manifesting as anxiety, trying to rationalise how you could lose so many people; in your head even if it’s a bad reason, there _has_ to be a reason. A curse, a god, whatever. But it’s not. It’s just chaos. It’s just the universe. You’ve had a shitty time of it but you kept going, and that makes you strong. Loving, even with the loss, makes you brave.”

Peter leans back. “That’s pretty sentimental for Michelle Jones.”

She blushes. “Shut up. I just… don’t want you living with a guilty conscience.”

His face changes; darkens slightly. He looks away from her, eyes scanning the skyline of the city across the water. The lights glitter against the black night sky. She wishes she could draw it in motion, like a moving portrait from Harry Potter. 

“Peter?”

Like he’d timed it, fireworks explode against heavy dark clouds before he can say whatever it is he’d been trying not to. Red, green, and gold light illuminates his face. “Happy New Year, babushka.”

MJ decides to let it go. That might be how it really started, she will reflect years later, one hand resting against her swollen stomach and the other on the cold side of the bed; letting it go that night, giving him the material to build a dam to hide behind. 

MJ kisses him. “Happy New Year, Loser.”

* * *

Pepper’s waiting up for him when he gets back. 

Peter sets the keys in the little glass dish by the door and leans against the wall. “What are you reading?”

Pepper looks up. She has to actually glance at the title like she’d completely forgotten. “ _Emma._ For the fifth time too many.”

He smiles. Flops onto the couch beside her. 

“You missed the ball drop,” she says. 

“I know.” He closes his eyes and leans his head back. “Was Morgan upset?”

“I’m sure she would have been if she hadn’t fallen asleep at like, nine.” That gets a snort out of him. She smiles. “Hey. Can we talk?”

“About?”

“About you.” 

He opens his eyes and turns his head to look at her. “What’s to talk about?”

Pepper’s eyes turn sad. She reaches up and brushes his hair back. “You’re overworking yourself, baby.”

“Pep…”

“I just want you to be happy, you know? I worry about you all the time, and… God, Peter, I feel you slipping away from me more and more and it’s… it scares me. It reminds me of—”

“Don’t say it.”

He can’t hear that right now. Even if he knows it’s true, he can’t hear it. 

Pepper sighs. “I just need to know that I still—”

Peter takes her hand. His voice is steady and serious when he says, “I’m not going anywhere. I’m never leaving you. You’re my someone, okay? I know that I’ve been distracted lately, but I just dropped out of a project that’s gonna mean more free time, and I… I think Nat’s gonna stop dragging me around so much. I’ll finish college in the summer and then everything will go back to how it was before I left.”

Pepper squeezes his hand. “I don’t want you to regress. I just want you to talk to me.”

“I talk to you. We’re talking.”

She smiles. “So I don’t have anything to worry about?”

“No,” he promises. “I’m fine. I’ve got a plan. And _now,”_ he stands up, plants a kiss on her cheek, “I’m gonna go check on my Shmorganborg.” 

Pepper laughs. “Don’t wake her up.”

* * *

Morgan is already awake when Peter slips into her room. Everything is awash in pink from the flower-shaped light on her wall. Two big brown eyes stare at him from underneath a space-themed blanket. 

“I missed it,” she says sadly. 

“Yeah,” Peter walks over. “Me too.”

That seems to make her feel better. She throws the blanket back and pats the bed. Peter grins and obliges her, pulling her against his chest once he’s settled under the covers. 

“I don’t want you to go back to college,” she whispers into the crook of his neck. “I miss you too much.”

“I know. I miss you too. But guess what?”

“What?”

“I’m gonna come back for spring break, and after this semester the only thing I have to do is online stuff, so I’ll basically be _done.”_

“Really?!”

“Really. I’ll be around so much you’ll get sick of me again.”

“ _No,”_ she says, snuggling closer. “You’re my best friend.”

His chest constricts. He almost can’t speak. It’s completely fucking insane, the love he feels for her. He’d been there the minute she was born, held her in his arms when she’d only weighed seven pounds and four ounces. He’d watched her learn to speak and walk, and now she’s four, and it feels like she’s all grown up already. His baby sister who scrunches up her nose just like him and sings off-key in the car with Happy just like he does; and Tony will never know any of it. 

Peter kisses the top of her head. “I love you.”

“I love you, too.” She squirms. “Read me a story?”

Peter hums, reaching over to the bedside table to grab the nearest book. “What’ve we got here?”

“Frog and Toad,” Morgan reports, resting her chin on his shoulder. 

“Oh, Frog and Toad? My favorite suit-wearing amphibians. What are they up to now?”

“Arguing about chores.”

Peter flips to the first page and finds that she’s right. They take turns reading, but by the end she’s almost out of it. 

“ _I am happy. I am very happy. This morning when I woke up I felt good because the sun was shining. I felt good because I was a frog. And I felt good because I have you as a friend.”_

Peter closes the book. Morgan’s breathing has levelled out and her eyelids flicker as she dreams. 

For the first time in what feels like weeks, Peter actually falls asleep that night. 

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AHHH oh my god it’s over!!! I just wanna thank u all for your continued support and feedback, it means everything to me <3 you’re all amazing and I love each and every one of you
> 
> also fun fact: do no harm is not, in fact, the first rule of the Hippocratic Oath—but I kept it in because I came up with the idea for the scene before I knew that and also, it added dramatic effect lmao

**Author's Note:**

> hope u enjoyed!! pls lmk what u thought!!


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